I spent a bit of time today trying to figure out this Sandra Fluke controversy. The gist of it seems that she attended a Catholic school, was overcharged for contraceptives by a factor of ten, and wants the school to pay for them. (I suppose some pharmacy rep. got a raise for wining and dining her doctor.) Why this is news is beyond me, but it does provide a good opportunity to talk about a field of personal interest, parasitology.

Few people realize it, but parasites are some of the most highly evolved organisms on the planet. Thanks to all of their needs being met by their host, and their extreme specialization, many parasites have evolved to the point that they are little more than a digestive system and a set of gonads. They are so highly evolved that it is difficult to discern where many parasites fit into the phylogenetic scheme of things. Lacking the more complicated traits and identifying genes of their nearest cousins, there is nothing to suggest where to put them in a tree.

That is the trouble with big government. It is becoming a progressively better host on which the moochers feed. If this health care nonsense is allowed to stand, we can be certain that the drug companies will sell more $1000 non-generic prescriptions (contraceptive and otherwise). More and more people, like Sandra Fluke, will become incapable of making or unwilling to make sensible healthcare decisions. Without competency as a need, fewer people will have it.