The current Medicare operation—reimbursing medical goods and services to a growing number of people without basing the reimbursement benefit on the actual cost of the services—is unsustainable, but there are some possible remedies.
Posthumous fatherhood and postmenopausal motherhood raise a multitude of legal, ethical, and social concerns that the law and regulatory agencies have not been able to adequately address to date.
An ethical case that was eventually decided in the US Supreme Court involves the right of patients to request an independent third-party review if their HMO refuses to authorize treatments or procedures deemed medically necessary.