Lobby_Congress

High Regulation Benefits the Delivery of Health Care and Human Services There seems to be a belief that removing regulation from programs means that they will run better. That, as the banking industry has just confirmed, is not the case at all. While too much regulation can be said to suppress the ability to provide services, it is also true that a failure to regulate enough will annihilate a service and its community. This has been proven repeatedly. Regulation is vital, for the most part, where health and human services are apprehensive, because the public health is a key matter of the government. All laws are passed to assure the safety and security of the public and health and human services are offered straight to the community to lend a hand to them in times of assistance. In times of great need, people may be taken advantage of or easily led off course. For example, after hurricanes Rita and Ike contractors and others raised prices astronomically to take advantage of the public. Where health and other human services are concerned, the risk of not regulating their provision is that the community will be misled into receiving substandard care or will be unjustly or inappropriately treated. If the community does not have faith in the government services they are getting, they could start to take matters into their own hands. That is a risk that creates even more possibility of chaos and people acting out of control. The community must be safe from harm and only effective government regulation is capable of doing just that. High Regulation Makes Delivery of Health Care and Human Services too Complex, Bureaucratic and Reduces Quality of Care There is a point at which a nation must decide whether it wants to regulate or to accomplish tasks. Regulation requires many people to review, approve, re-consider, and then review again, every step, decision, and action taken by an agency. When the agency is one that provides health care or human services the time involved can risk lives and irrevocably harm persons. Intelligence is required at these services, but too often regulation is confused with intelligence. One cannot make that mistake when providing such important services. The public in a personal or national emergency must be able to rely on their government to be there and care for them. Public protection is one of the chief responsibilities of government. Personal and national emergencies require quick action to meet urgent needs. Urgent action for urgent needs cannot be taken with regulation because regulation requires a bureaucratic hierarchy to be in place. Such hierarchy must be in place under regulation because persons higher up in the bureaucracy are normally the only ones who have the authority to approve any actions, even when such actions need to be taken urgently. That is how regulation works to “assure” mistakes are not made. Unfortunately, this method of operating means that people end up waiting too long for services or that services arrive too late to help anyone. When the service is health care or human services the result is death or grave loss. Moreover, providing health care and human services is already a costly endeavor. To add a level of regulatory hierarchy of individuals to assure “proper” decisions are made means that more money is being spent but less services are being provided to the public. It is more important to provide human care and services than it is to assure that one low-level employee did not overstep his or her bounds. Government must understand its priorities when caring for the public.