Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by mistrial9 129 days ago
in Western history, culturally, Church was a founding force for the existance of hospitals, full-stop. Repeat with more money and more fallable humans and yes some of what you say is accurate. But, if you start naming the behavior as if it is synonymous with the original founders of Hospitals, you a) create an intellectual dishonesty on your part, b) attract wing-nuts and sociopaths who are looking for a place to join in the chanting, c) obscure important details while the casual readers focus on the glaring finger pointing.

If you want to actually contribute to this very difficult topic, please refrain from welding disparate labels together in the introductory materials.
2 comments
spwa4 128 days ago
Oh I fully realize that the original hospitals were ... let's say better than the gutter by about 10%, and no more than that. Both for the patients and everyone else in the street or even city.

And I do realize the only reason the Vatican management is better is because the Vatican is ALSO corrupt ... but with different masters. The improvement is coming from the conflict between these groups. I do get the impression the Vatican is actually the more moral of the two parties, meaning compared to the government, but not by a huge margin.

link
wizzwizz4 129 days ago
The way I read it, GP is saying that the Vatican's influence reduces such unethical distribution of medical information. Your response reads like a rebuttal, but I'm not sure what you're trying to say, nor rebut.
link
mistrial9 129 days ago
>in most EU countries is that the Vatican still has control over the board of a very surprising number of hospitals.

>Needless to say, the EU governments really hate that

> if the government wants the Vatican out of the board ... they have to increase spending on that hospital, often by a lot. I'd call them "Vatican hospitals"

> one thing government and the Vatican really agree on is that they do not want patients to know the underlying financial arrangements around hospitals

> in many cases it's quite difficult to find who controls a hospital even though it's technically public information)

I am responding to these somewhat "breathless" statements that imply more than they delineate. My rebuttal is that these words frame a kind of inquiry that is common among conspiracy-attracted commentors.

The subject deserves more rigor and less insinuation IMO.

link