There is much more social trust of physicians than managed care businesses, here or abroad. To understand the lack of trust in managed care, look at these data. The Census Bureau calculated that about 71.5 million Americans lacked insurance for at least part of a year in the mid-1990s. It's not just managed care and indemnity insurance to which some working Americans do not have access. It's medicines too.
Prescription drugs are the fastest growing personal expense in health care.
Eighty percent of retirees take a prescribed drug daily, and 19 million have no drug coverage. Not nurses and not doctors. For doctors, it's 65 percent and for nurses it's 80 percent. Yet trust in doctors seems to be eroding. Physicians' sample cabinets are full, and corporate suites for Chicago sports events have never been empty.