Lion Rock's Free Market Interns Right in the Face of Hong Kong Legislators

Hong Kong's sole free market think tank, The Lion Rock Institute, trains and empowers a steady inflow of interns in defending the cause of liberty, right in the face of Hong Kong legislators.  The video and transcript below is just one of the more recent examples of that.  More speeches like this one can be viewed on the Lion Rock's YouTube channel.

2015-02-09 衛生事務委員會特別會議, Meeting of Panel on Health Services : 私營醫療機構規管諮詢文件, Consultation Document on Regulation of Private Healthcare Facilities

Review on Regulation of Private Healthcare Facilities

Kellie Wong, The Lion Rock Institute

Chairman,

The first question that came to mind upon reading this proposal was - Are you doing this for the Hong Kong people?  Or to advance your own political agenda?  

Our healthcare services are already second most expensive in the world, after the US.  Now we want to outdo the Americans in the race towards bankruptcy?!  Increased restrictions against new or foreign-trained doctors, the many ‘inspectors’ needed, new equipment, new procedures, new drugs, new tests - where will that first $50 billion come from?  Your own pocket?!

Has the Hong Kong government ignored the bottomless pit of healthcare costs that threaten to bankrupt the US, the largest economy in the world?  I quote the great Lyndon Johnson in his 1963 Great Society speech, ‘This administration here and now declares unconditional war on poverty.’  Hm.  Fast forward half a century, US healthcare spending increased 12 fold, yet we still have the American families that haven’t worked for three generations, because, conveniently, they ‘earn’ more receiving monthly cheques in the mail than working and paying tax.  

The Coroner’s court in Hong Kong currently takes care of preventing medical malpractice and should have no problem continuing to do so.  For the government to take over the court’s role is to breach the Basic Law, following the footsteps of our friends up North.  I’m sure you’re familiar with the standards of medical services within that system.  Increased regulation will also only restrict medical supply, particularly, good doctors,  So in a few years, only the rich who can afford to go abroad to receive the right treatment by the right doctor, will be able to reap the benefits of the proposed voluntary health insurance. 

Think a little harder before entertaining this proposal.  Given that Hong Kong people live the longest on Earth, we don’t need increased facility regulation in the healthcare sector.  Rather, we need a continual fresh supply of doctors to rescue the decaying medical system, so that, hopefully, the Hong Kong people can, once again, entrust their health and lives to their own medical system.  Is politics more important than the lives of our people?

Thank you Chairman.

Check out more Legco speeches by Kellie and other Lion Rock Institute interns here.