Dear Editor,
Richard Dalton’s letter, “Gifford Medical Center cannot survive financially” raises some interesting questions about the way we deliver health care in Vermont and, for that matter, the rest of this sad and troubled nation. These go beyond whether Gifford can survive or not. Mr. Dalton summed it up perfectly: “the stark reality and hard facts come down to money and patient numbers.”
For far too long we have treated our health care as just another business transaction, a commodity exchanged for money that one party profits from. And as any business school will teach you, “profit is revenue minus expenses.” Continue reading….