http://www.reason.com/…

Take the case of four-year-old Elias Dillner. In 2004, Dillner’s parents were told by doctors that their son too would benefit from cochlear implants. After being fitted with the first implant, Dillner’s insurance provider said the second operation could not be “prioritized.” The family would have to wait. “We will do anything,” Elias’s mother told reporters, “even if it means that we have to take out a loan for the operation.” Without insurance, the second procedure would likely cost $40,000.

But Dillner’s truculent insurance provider was not Aetna or Kaiser, but the notoriously generous Swedish welfare state, where health care is “free.” And because there is no private clinic in Sweden that could perform the operation, Elias will sit in a queue, hoping, in lieu of privatization, for prioritization. Swedish legislator Robert Uitto said that the Dillner case was unfortunate, but “People shouldn’t, on principle, be allowed to purchase care in the public system.”

For those too busy or lazy to find evidence against claims Michael Moore makes in his new film this article is full of them. Enjoy.

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