Health care is expansive, sure, <br> but individuals can fight back

To the editor:
The problems with the health care system today are ones of cost, profit and distribution of resources (“Langevin co-sponsors plan for national health care,” Feb. 11, pbn.com). Costs – for things such as the latest prescription drugs, which then are shown to not work any better than older generics; for expensive tests; and for extreme health care for people at the end of their lives – will continue to rise as long as third-party insurers, pharmaceutical companies and others who are heavily invested in our current failed system, continue to profit from it.
At the same time, some of us – who carefully chose what we eat, who exercise, who often choose alternative health care (e.g., massage, acupuncture and chiropractic treatments) – and who eschew Big Pharma products and other nonsense – will continue to be healthy outside of the mainstream health care industry.
Any successful national solution must build on the notion of personal responsibility, focus on the fair distribution of taxpayers’ increasingly limited resources, and offer multiple options that are designed to meet patients’ needs. Too many, if not all, of the current proposals I have seen (and as a Massachusetts resident, been subjected to) are designed to limit third-party insurers’ risk, and to protect Big Pharma’s and other industry giants’ profits, rather than to provide consumers with a reasonable selection of plans.