Fox News “medical contributor” Nicole Saphier, the radiologist who wants fewer people to have health insurance, blamed Obamacare and increased medical coverage for a drop in Americans’ life expectancy.
Media Matters caught Saphier taking a break from her completely unqualified role as a legal expert and back on her anti-health-insurance soap box last week.
“Americans are dying younger, from largely preventable disease and bad health policy decisions,” Saphier began. But her solution is not to provide more or better health care or any other constructive measures to help people live healthier lives. No, her "solution" is to take away health insurance so that people will be “incentivized” to take better care of themselves.
SAPHIER: And the problem that I have with this is heart disease alone costs about $230 billion to the United States, and the Affordable Care Act did nothing to help that except take away -- they took away the incentivizations for good behavior choices, by saying that however you act, whatever you do, everything's going to be covered. And so preventable illness is running rampant across the United States.
Not surprisingly, Saphier did not provide any statistics to back up her ludicrous claim that people don’t care about getting diabetes or heart disease so long as their insulin or bypass operations are covered - and copays, schmopays!
Nor did Saphier show any concern about covering the kinds of diseases that are not preventable.
No, what we have previously seen Saphier care about is doctor burnout. During a 2016 Fox & Friends appearance in which she was prodded to blame Obamacare for a drop in life expectancy, she said:
SAPHIER: What has happened with the implementation of the ACA is we’re in the midst of a physician burnout and shortage crisis due to all of these newly insured patients.
…
What we need to be doing to improve health care in America is, we need to foster the doctor/patient relationship. We need to make our doctors happier. We need to treat them better. But we also need to start holding patients accountable for some of their lifestyle choices that are negatively affecting their health.
Let’s not mince words, however. What Saphier is really saying is that some people don't deserve medical services and I think we can guess who they are.
You probably won’t be surprised to hear that Saphier said nothing about ditching any part of her own health insurance, just to make sure she remains "incentivized."
You can watch this disgrace to the medical profession below, from the February 7, 2020 Fox & Friends, via Media Matters.
Oh wait…. wouldn’t she be paid for this gig?
Its bizarre that the situation she describes might lead some to think we need more doctors (hello AMA!), but no, this nut thinks we need fewer patients!