Sunday, January 13, 2013

Misleading headlines in MSM

Seems like our local papers love to mislead to make the govt looks good. Their headline usually reflects things are well in S'pore.  But read carefully and somewhere in the article, we can tease out the facts.

Take the recent headline in the Straits Times  - "Poll : S'poreans are best prepared for health costs".  That is good news but how can it be true when the ground feeling is that medical cost is getting out of hand and most are saying 'can die but cannot afford to be sick' ?

Then doubt starts to set in when it is stated in the report that S'poreans could be underestimating the expenses and it is their perception rather than actual ability to meet health expenses.  It is vague which age group was polled. If it is those young working adults in their prime of health, who had yet to experience the red tape which renders CPF Medishield (insurance scheme) and Medisave ( medical cost payment) useless. Most of the time we have to come out hard cash instead of being able to tap on CPF for our medical expenses. Likely this group would think they are adequately prepare since they may not even have first hand experience how expensive it is - even with subsidy.

Read on and we will realise the S'pore are NOT prepare at all as the shortfall between the medical treatments that people here need and those they are prepared to pay for is $124 million !  Now the truth states surfacing. It then states that the shortfall is expected to rise to $737 million by 2020.

So if one just glance at the headline which is suppose to capture the essence of the article, one would have been totally misled by it. No wonder net citizens are calling it the 'Shit Times'.

Would not the heading 'S'poreans are ill prepare to meet actual medical cost' says it all and honestly ?

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