For over 30 years, I worked as a registered nurse in Northeast Louisiana. I practiced as a mental health nurse and school nurse during my career. During my time in both of those positions, I saw the tandem of three important facts about the American healthcare system present themselves.

They are:

• The American healthcare system is the most innovative in the world!
• Socialized medicine would ruin our healthcare system!
• Supply Chain management is pivotal to access to care!

These two facts are almost mirror images of each other – two sides of the same coin. One shows the greatness of the american healthcare system and one shows that if handled improperly, the miracle drugs prescribed can actually ruin lives.

First, let me address the innovation in our healthcare system. Throughout my career, I watched as new and innovative drugs hit the market and saved lives. I started my career as a student at Baptist Nursing school in Memphis, Tennessee in the 60s. The amount of strides we’ve made in medicine from then to now is incredible. Even today, as I watch the news and see headlines about the coronavirus, I am encouraged by all of the innovations being made to fight this nasty virus. Companies like Gilead, Lilly, and AstraZeneca are all working tirelessly and competing to come up with treatments. This is the free market at work! We are the only country with the right free market drug discovery system and enough innovative companies to develop a cure to COVID-19. That’s why when the cure comes, it’ll come courtesy of the red, white, and blue!

Next, unlike countries where medicine is socialized, here in America our companies have huge incentives to find cures. My daughter and her son lived in England for a year and the stories of them trying to get treatment during a time of sickness were terrible. Though they were lucky to only have a slight flu all those years ago, the lack of care they got from the socialized system was absolutely startling. In America however, the free market based medical system ensures that quality care is available. Anyone who has lived in a foreign country will tell you that Medicare For All would ruin our healthcare. Don’t believe the lies the Democrats will tell you – it just won’t work. That’s why we must embrace free market principles in medicine. A market based system is the only way that we can improve our access to care, lower costs, and allow for innovation in the drug industry.

This pandemic has shown us how quickly we can run out of much needed medical supplies. Thankfully, our president mobilized the full force of American industry in order to meet the demand. That was a good move by President Trump but it doesn’t have to be this way in times of epidemiological peace. By changing the way we think about what medications prescribe for various ailments, we can ease the burden on our supply chains.

Our American drug companies should be allowed to thrive and bring us new miracle drugs. They’ve done it before, and they will do it again. We need to embrace innovators, reject Medicare For All, and let our American private sector companies lead us out of the COVID crisis.

Lu Jones, RN

Monroe, LA