Re:The First Randomized Controlled Trial on Vitamin D and Co...
by shajznnckfke on Thursday September 03, 2020 @04:46PM
(#24368705)
If the costs are low, then the free supply chain won’t cost much to create. If the public health savings are greater than the costs, it may be better to just mail free supplements to people than mail them postcards advising they go out and purchase them (advice most people will ignore, no matter how low the cost).
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Re:The First Randomized Controlled Trial on Vitamin D and Co...
by sokoloff on Thursday September 03, 2020 @06:18PM
(#24369533)
How many people will need to be paid to operate this free supply chain to provide a good that is perfectly well-supplied inexpensively privately now? How many to answer questions, field calls about missed shipments, lost pills, changes of address, etc?
The answer to every problem shouldn’t be “create a new government-funded agency to make this happen ‘for free’”. Mr Market isn’t the answer for every single thing, but sometimes it’s fine to let existing private supply chains operate. Supplying cheap dietary supplements seems to me like an area where that’s the case.
It may need to be added to SNAP/WIC; that’s a reasonable task for government to busy itself supporting this.