[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 155 (2009), Part 14]
[House]
[Pages 19559-19560]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                WHO IS GOING TO PROVIDE THE HEALTH CARE?

  (Mr. AKIN asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. AKIN. Mr. Speaker, the Democrats are proposing that they're going 
to take over 20 percent of our economy. They're proposing they're going 
to spend at least $1 trillion, probably $2 trillion, in doing that, and 
they're going to put bureaucrats in charge of health care decisions. 
Now, this is not really a new idea. This has been tried a lot by other 
countries. It's called socialized medicine. So the question before us 
is very straightforward. It is this:

[[Page 19560]]

  If you get sick, where do you want to be treated? Do you want to 
travel to Europe? Do you want to travel to Canada or do you want to 
stay in the good, old USA?
  I had that experience 9 years ago here. I had newly been elected as a 
Congressman. I got the first physical I'd had in 10 years because I'd 
had lousy health care. They told me, Yeah, you're doing great, 
Congressman Akin, except for one thing: You have cancer.
  When you hear the word ``cancer,'' it causes you to stop and think. 
Because of the American health care system, I'm standing here today, 
but I'll tell you the statistics of what would happen if you were in 
the United Kingdom. There is a 50 percent chance you'd be dead with the 
type of cancer I had. That's the question: Who is going to provide the 
health care?

                          ____________________