MARINA DEL REY, CA -- The Patients Bill of Rights is a fraud, said an Ayn Rand Institute senior writer.
     Instead of promoting rights, as its supporters promise, the bill will actually diminish the freedom of doctors, hospitals, insurance companies and the very patients it claims to protect, said Robert W. Tracinski. The bill is an attempt to grant special privileges to some which are to be paid for by trampling on the rights of others.
      Tracinski observed that:
 

• The government restriction of doctors freedom to practice medicine is causing many to quit the profession.
• The Patients Bill of Rights is a collection of pseudo-rights that actually undermine the rights of all Americans.
• The American health crisis was caused by the government granting special privileges to some at the expense of others, not by greedy doctors or insurance companies demanding too much money for medical services.

     We can only begin to reverse the government-created damage to our health care system by upholding genuine rightsthe individual rights of both patients and doctors to be free from government interference, said Tracinski. If our politicians really want to fight for rights, let them fight for a free market in medicine.