[HN Gopher] The 1788 Doctors' Riot
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       The 1788 Doctors' Riot
        
       Author : tuxxy
       Score  : 52 points
       Date   : 2021-05-18 11:54 UTC (11 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (en.wikipedia.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (en.wikipedia.org)
        
       | redis_mlc wrote:
       | Just for context, in that time, the countries including Japan who
       | didn't use bodies for medical training ended up a century behind
       | the West.
       | 
       | Japanese doctors and scientists were literally embarrassed when
       | they flipped thru Western anatomy books.
       | 
       | In China, the Han custom is not to be an organ donor, hence the
       | start of Falun Gong/Uighur/prisoner transplants, etc., which has
       | turned into a profit center that funds their entire hospital
       | system.
        
       | dm319 wrote:
       | Fascinating. It is quite shocking to read about our world not so
       | long ago. I did dissection at university from a cadavar donated
       | for education. We attended a service afterwards, prior to the
       | cremation. I was very grateful to have the chance to learn from
       | it in a way that would have been almost impossible using
       | prosections or models.
        
       | JoeAltmaier wrote:
       | <pedantry> No doctors actually rioted; thus the title words
       | Doctors' Riot seems strange </pedantry>
        
         | etrevino wrote:
         | In that era riots were often named for locations or the
         | thing/person/event that instigated them. So, rather than it
         | being a statement of who was rioting, it was an assertion for
         | the reason for the riot. That's why we have the Sacheverell
         | (sp?) and Gordon Riots: the first was sparked by the
         | prosecution of an important prelate, the second was instigated
         | by an English nobleman who opposed the restoration of rights to
         | Catholic Englishmen.
        
         | nwsm wrote:
         | I agree. The implication is the opposite of reality, and I
         | can't help but feel it's intentional.
        
           | etrevino wrote:
           | It's not intentional. It's just that how we described riots
           | changed from the 18th C to today. Now we often describe who
           | is rioting in the name of the riot. Back then they would
           | often describe what sparked the riot in the name as opposed
           | to who was rioting.
        
       | iDisagreedEar wrote:
       | I'd love a good riot against Physicians in 2021.
       | 
       | 2 centuries of corruption has lined their pockets and caused the
       | rest of us to avoid medical care.
       | 
       | I say this as I'm married to a doctor taking home 200-250k/yr. I
       | don't mind shooting myself in the foot to save life.
        
         | cfu28 wrote:
         | Physician salaries only make up about 8.6% of all healthcare
         | costs. That's less than Germany, Australia, France, etc.
         | 
         | Healthcare costs do need to come down, but slashing physician
         | salaries should be near the bottom of the list of things to
         | target.
         | 
         | https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/compensation-issues/ph...
         | 
         | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6179628/#__sec1...
        
         | neffy wrote:
         | Strictly this problem is fairly local to the US - other
         | countries manage to not have an engineered shortage of
         | medically trained folks, and provide general, non-bankrupting,
         | insurance schemes to pay them for their expertise.
        
         | biggestdummy wrote:
         | Healthcare is so corrupt that life expectancy in the US went
         | from 40 years old in 1880 to nearly 80 years old today. What a
         | crime! https://ourworldindata.org/life-expectancy
        
         | msrenee wrote:
         | I would look up the ladder before blaming physicians. It's not
         | the high salary of the doctor that's inflated the cost of
         | medical care. It's insurance, middlemen, overpaid
         | administrators, and the general move to for-profit medicine
         | that's to blame in my experience. Doctors make good money, but
         | they also go through 8 years of expensive schooling to get
         | there and are often just making ends meet for years after
         | school.
        
           | moshmosh wrote:
           | Everything's part of the problem. It's why it's so hard to
           | find "the thing" that causes high US healthcare costs. Every
           | single part of it is more expensive than it should be,
           | including doctors, and it all adds up to a system that's
           | _way_ more expensive than it should be, without any single
           | entity or group being responsible for most of the problem.
        
           | cat199 wrote:
           | Not in the industry, and these are complex issues, but the
           | AMA is made up of doctors and is also a huge part of how
           | medical professionals are qualified and has heavy influence
           | on how funding for training, etc. is allocated. So while an
           | individual physician may not be 'the problem', blaming the
           | AMA (and so 'physicians') shouldn't be dismissed outright in
           | favor of the other groups you mention, which are also part of
           | the problem
        
             | cfu28 wrote:
             | The AMA certainly has physicians as members, but I would
             | call it a stretch to say they represent the interests of a
             | majority of physicians.
             | 
             | Plus, the AMA/AOA has been lobbying for more residency
             | spots for a while now, which would increase supply for
             | physicians. These are generally things that could bring
             | down costs.
        
           | mam3 wrote:
           | Where did you see that years of education "should" or in
           | general "do" lead to higher salaries lol ?
        
             | tryonenow wrote:
             | How do you incentivize people to spend 8 years of
             | irrecoverable youth studying, and taking on the risk of
             | succeeding and finding work after? Most people are simply
             | not that interested in learning for learning's sake - and
             | even if they were it wouldn't necessarily be a practical
             | enough choice to generate enough doctors to satisfy the
             | needs of society...
        
           | [deleted]
        
       | smcl wrote:
       | I was surprised not to see any mention of Burke & Hare under the
       | "See Also" section:
       | https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burke_and_Hare_murders
       | 
       | These guys started out doing roughly the same as those doctors -
       | robbing freshly dug graves for anatomical study - but they moved
       | on to killing to provide the bodies instead. Pretty grim
        
         | dmix wrote:
         | One of the classic true crime story.
         | 
         | Edit: that facial reconstruction of William Burke is really
         | interesting.
        
         | mariuolo wrote:
         | > but they moved on to killing to provide the bodies instead
         | 
         | Wasn't H. H. Holmes also accused of this?
         | (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H_H_Holmes)
        
         | PeterWhittaker wrote:
         | It's there now! Was added after you wrote this and before I
         | read your comment.
        
           | smcl wrote:
           | Oh great! I was considering adding it later on but I was on
           | the tram and didn't fancy fiddling with wikipedia on my phone
           | :D
        
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       (page generated 2021-05-18 23:03 UTC)