All health care is important to society. We are important to each other; we need to take care of each other; that's important to all of us as responsible citizens. By societal definition, we are not "on our own" and responsible to nobody.

I cannot repeat this enough: During the Reagan administration, East Moline State Hospital, a mental heath facility in western Illinois, was emptied of its obviously undeserving patients. My mother had been a freeloader in previous years.

The hospital then became reopened as East Moline Correctional Facility, and the previous patients then became inmates. Prison guards are so much less expensive than hospital staff.

Society feels no impact, of course. Untreated mental patients are harmless to themselves and others, of course. Society saves so much money, and we benefit so well from this idiocy.

What could possibly go wrong?