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John McCain's Health Records
Should presidential candidates be required to release their health records for public inspection?
The question has come up with Sen. John McCain, in part because in 2000 he was diagnosed with melanoma, the most serious form of skin cancer, and had surgery to remove it. At 71, he is also the oldest candidate.
The presumptive Republican nominee had a physical Monday and told the media that he's fine and that there's no evidence that his melanoma has returned. He promised to release his full medical report in April. (When he ran for president the first time, he released 1,500 pages of medical and psychiatric records, according to the New York Times.)
The health of presidents has often been a secretive subject in the past. As WebMD reported, while cover-ups of presidential conditions were once common, today we can find out details about President Bush's latest physical, such as his percentage of body fat, cholesterol levels, and what he takes to help with seasonal allergies.
Political expert Larry Sabato, who was quoted in our article, argues that all nominees should be required to release their records so we know if they are healthy enough to withstand the rigors of the job. Do you agree? Let us know what you think.
Valarie Basheda
Managing Editor, WebMD
Jarret Cassaniti contributed research for this entry.
The question has come up with Sen. John McCain, in part because in 2000 he was diagnosed with melanoma, the most serious form of skin cancer, and had surgery to remove it. At 71, he is also the oldest candidate.
The presumptive Republican nominee had a physical Monday and told the media that he's fine and that there's no evidence that his melanoma has returned. He promised to release his full medical report in April. (When he ran for president the first time, he released 1,500 pages of medical and psychiatric records, according to the New York Times.)
The health of presidents has often been a secretive subject in the past. As WebMD reported, while cover-ups of presidential conditions were once common, today we can find out details about President Bush's latest physical, such as his percentage of body fat, cholesterol levels, and what he takes to help with seasonal allergies.
Political expert Larry Sabato, who was quoted in our article, argues that all nominees should be required to release their records so we know if they are healthy enough to withstand the rigors of the job. Do you agree? Let us know what you think.
Valarie Basheda
Managing Editor, WebMD
Jarret Cassaniti contributed research for this entry.
4 Comments:
While I agree we need to know if a presidential (or ANY other candidate) is healthy enough to run the city, county, state or country, OR EVEN A CLASSROOM OF KIDS, they also ought to have some privacy!
If they wish to share this information, then that ought to be up to them!
Digging into people's privacy has gone WAY overboard, and inconsistantly so, in just about every job, agency and office.
For instance, you can work for the white house and have more privacy AND know who will have access to it, than some ACS volunteer positions in some jurisdictions.
ONLY those issues which are relevent to one's position need be concern, which when it comes to congress, the senate (state or federal), or state assembly, we rarely, if ever have even that information about these people!
Honestly, I am not a McCain supporter, HOWEVER, I AM a supporter of rights to privacy!
Does McCain's cancer record have ANYTHING to do with his ability to run, or not be able to run the country?
Doesn't EVERYONE have some kind of health history that they might be totally over and may not want or need to share that information with the world? (Or can they even recall if they had chicken pox or measles when they were children? And does it really matter if they did?)
Disclosures have gotten to the point of ridiculousness in some areas, and don't go quite as far as I think they need to in others.
Who pried into McCain's life anyhow to find out about his having had skin cancer?
Another problem with this sort of invasiveness is the doctor &/or hospital reporting the information may have their own agenda. What if one was running for office (or applying for a job somehwere) and someone in the records department (or the doctor) had a pending lawsuit against them? (I've seen this one first hand where a doctor was grossly incompetant, and following the HMO guidelines to not send ANY patients to specialists, which he followed, nearly killing at least 3 patients I am aware of!) They can make it so one cannot get a job just about anywhere where medical background is brought up as an issue!
On the other hand, if the doctor/medical records wants someone in public office, then they can hide whatever they wantto, and no one would be the wiser!
AND if the person whose records are disclosed DOES have a medical problem, such as cancer, will they EVER be able to get medical coverage for that in the private sector? NOT!
One's privacy is sacred and not anyone's business unless it would directly impact one's work at ANY level!
People are misdiagnosed all the time, but doctors rarely report a misdiagnosis of any kind!
If a person can do the job, then they ought to be able to do it!
This area of politics AND employment has been micromanaged to death... THUS the HIPAA act (although it could have gone further!)
Would we elect a president in a wheel chair? One who has epilepsy? One with a heart problem?
What about those hidden problems that are never diagnosed until one drops dead?
Personally, I would never work for ANY company, agency or other entity that wanted to go into any part of my medical history that did not pertain directly to my ability to do my job. I would problably wear a medic-alert if I were diabetic, had allergies and such, and I would let those I worked with directly on a need to know basis, but only then.
If I had a medical problem that would possibly affect a job in an adverse way, I would look elsewhere for employment - Period!
I work for the state government in Preventive Health. Our data is always kept confidential, except for a few selected individuals and then only for the safety of the public. I think it should be handled the same way for presidential candidates and anyone running for public office.
Absolutely the health records of a prospective candidate for presidency should be made public. I mean if a candidate has pancreatic cancer and doesn't disclose this what an awful situation it would be if they got elected! It would be like buying a car that you are expecting to do great things for a long time and not knowing that the engine was about to die sometime in the near future. It would be totally unfair for the buyer if they didn't have this basic info. Likewise especially a president who was in serious danger of dying from a cancer, a heart attack and autoimmune disease, the public should definitely have such vital information.
Dr. Marz
The only reason not to disclose is because he's hiding something. Someone who use drugs doesn't volumteer for a drug test. We the people should demand releasing these records to a group of independant Dr's, and they should only report on diagnosis' that will effect his presidency. (ie.dementia, cancer) If he has IBS or uses viagra don't tell us. Don't forget McCain supports the Patriot Act. He doesn't give your pricacy the same respect.
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