Real Carrots for Doctors

A column in the NYT this morning says we should provide more carrots for doctors.  This sounds like a worthy cause, until you read the thing and find out he really means carrots as in financial incentives.  That may be well and good, but as the columnist states later, we already pay nearly twice as much for the services and tests as most industrialized countries.  It seems that our multiplicity of payers gives leverage to the firms doing the tests as well as the doctors providing the services.  A single payer would obviously by more efficient, but socialism!   To get back to my original observation, more vegetables would probably improve health outcomes also.  But the typical doctor is about as knowledgeable about the health benefits of diet as the average taxi driver.  To most people, a calorie is a calorie whether it comes from a jelly donut or a carrot.  Until we break through this barrier of fundamental ignorance, people will continue to die or live unnecessarily shortened lives dut to dietary choices.