Shorter Veterans Administration Medical Protocol: Dope Them to the Gills and Hope That They Die Soon

After reading this story about how the Veterans Administration grossly over-prescribes pain medications, it's hard for me to reach any other conclusion.

Or you can listen to the story:



If you subscribe to the maxim "never blame on cupidity that which can be blamed on stupidity", then one might conclude that the VA's medical system is overtaxed and that the doctors are prescribing pain meds because that is all they can do to help right now. The doctors hope that they can eventually get to everyone's real problems, but they can't, so they hand out the pain pills and hope that the vets can maintain until its their turn.

But many don't. They die. And the VA is, in part, complicit in their deaths.

Cheaper to just wave the flag and say "thank you" to a uniformed soldier than it is to spend money to try to help them. One might have to raise taxes on the plutocrats to do that.