Bill Moyers: Money-Driven Medicine: The Real Reason Health Care Costs So Much

The world of medicine has changed radically since I was a kid in East Texas. Back then, Dr. Sam Tenney made house calls for a couple of bucks a visit. Dr. Granbury raced to a patient's side with such speed you could hear his tires screeching around the courthouse square blocks away. And if you needed a prescription, Dr. Wyatt would offer to drop it off at your door on his way to the hospital - a non-profit community hospital, by the way, run by civic-minded citizens who counted every penny.

If any of them were around today, they would surely marvel at our high-tech medicine. But as prudent folks, they would also marvel - in a horrified way, I think - at the cost of it all. How did we get here?

Maggie Mahar wanted to find out. She's one of our best financial journalists - now, after years of research, she has written: MONEY-DRIVEN MEDICINE: THE REAL REASON HEALTH CARE COSTS SO MUCH. During their summer recess, if every member of the House and Senate would read it before returning to Washington, the outcome of the health care debate might be very different.

In this broadcast we will share with you a film based on Maggie Mahar's work. The book and the film couldn't be more timely as our country wrestles with what to do about money-driven medicine.

Watch the video at PBS