Richard Boxer has a very common sense piece in today’s Wall Street Journal that reminds us of just how criminally, stupidly, bureaucratic and wasteful our medical care system is in America. He relates the story of a truck driver who was experiencing symptoms of a heart attack while behind the wheel. Because his company had recently signed up with a company called Teledoc, he was able to phone a doctor, describe his symptoms, and get to an ER. Unlike the driver’s, most medical complaints don’t require a visit to the hospital, nor even to a physician’s office. Being able to phone a doctor for a urinary tract infection or a rash could save the employee’s valuable time and provide part-time work for doctors who’ve retired or gotten disgusted with the rigmarole of hospital practice (a mounting number). While Boxer didn’t mention it, Skype and similar technologies can even permit the physician to see the patient he or she is treating. Yet state and federal regulations make it difficult to provide this kind of efficient service. The free market could solve 90 percent of the troubles with our medical system. The other 10 percent could be handled by subsidies for the poor and chronically ill. This little story of the doctors who answer telephone calls is illustrative of the kind of creativity that would be possible without the dead weight of regulation and mandates.

Meanwhile, in Great Britain, the NHS is considering guidelines for the care of the “dying” that might hasten the deaths of those who may not be dying. That’s another kind of efficiency.