http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/15/world/europe/15greece.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1

ATHENS — Antonios Avgerinos, 59, a retired army pharmacist, always wanted his own pharmacy here. And why not? Greek law ensures that pharmacists get a 35 percent profit on all drugs sold, even over-the-counter medications.

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So much attention to nuance in the words. Indeed people do ‘deserve’ so many things. Getting that done for real is another story. What is a ‘no abortion’ person willing to offer the pregnant woman considering her first abortion? her second? her third? her fourth? her fifth? her sixth? What does she deserve?

http://www.tovima.gr/default.asp?pid=2&ct=1&artid=359513&dt=09/10/2010

For those non-Greek readers, here’s what google translate came up with:

The Social Security does not issue specific to diabetic footwear
Saturday, October 9, 2010
IKA shows callous towards people with diabetes who are at risk of amputation of lower limbs. This liability insurance does not provide for special treatment diabetic shoes because “… not avoid amputation of the leg, just delayed for a couple years and the expected benefit would be less than the estimated cost. The phrase contained in a letter sent by the officers of the Benefits Division of the Department of Social Security Sickness Benefit the Panhellenic Federation of Associations, People with Diabetes.

In a statement the federation stated that therapeutic shoes are essential and necessary preventive measure in people with diabetes are at high risk for amputation. It also emphasized that the response of the Special Committee’s Social Security no scientism, after conflicts with the valid international bibliographic data and financial studies κόστουςαποτελεσματικότητας in the diabetic foot, and the instructions and exhortations of the World Health Organization, International Diabetes Federation, etc. .

Representatives of the federation noted that the administration of therapeutic footwear diabetes, coupled with the establishment of diabetic foot clinics in hospitals could dramatically reduce the thousands of amputations in people with diabetes.

Can anyone say “death panels”?

…..it is clear that we owe the Byzantines the development of the modern institutions we call hospitals. But what may be more important, we owe to them the view that every member of society, from the greatest to the least, deserved the best quality healthcare available at the time. This is obviously relevant today, and as the U.S. debates the best way to provide healthcare for its citizens, we hope and pray that the Byzantine-Orthodox approach provides a model worthy of emulation.

You have to wonder what the EP and the folks at 79th Street will say to the image of Greek doctors butchering the weak to save a few euros. Maybe the Office of Church and Society will address this issue………….

Any gov’t program or state bureaucracy will ALWAYS be 5x worse than any private company individually, and 100x worse than the entire private sector with multiple competitors.