government to protect their freedom of choice and safety and on businesses to deliver uncompromised quality, and therefore value.

When each party recognizes their contributions to the health care crisis, makes a commitment to stop zero-sum behaviors, and embraces cross-stakeholder cooperation to effect those changes, we will begin to see real change in the system. Our health care system is broken and it will take nothing less than this attitude, cooperation, and willingness to change

When I was a child I remember sitting on the floor at church playing with a Noah’s Ark play set. It had a plastic miniature ark, pairs of tiny animals, and all the other characters you would expect. It kept me quiet and out of trouble, which is probably why my mom did not mind me missing so many of the pastor’s sermons at that point in my life.

Regardless of your faith, there is an important lesson to be learned from this simple yet eloquent story, which is probably why it or similar stories recur so frequently in oral and written traditions. Forewarned of the imminent life-destroying flood, Noah sets out to build an ark to save two of each animal, one male and one female, along with members of his immediate family to repopulate the Earth after the flood waters have receded. Although versions vary depending on their source, the basic concept behind the story is similar, which is where I draw my parallels to modern day health care.

For the few months they were together on this relatively small vessel, their collective need to survive the flood trumped their individual needs or desires. The lions could not eat the wildebeests, the humans could not endanger each other, and none of them could damage the ark, or they would all perish. Not that in such close quarters they did not want to harm each other from time to time, but they recognized the simple fact that for any of them to survive, that all of them had to survive.

I imagine such a voyage of cooperation undertaken by government, business, and individuals. One in which they each begin to recognize that their collective fate is intertwined in an inescapable way. The government depends on businesses and individuals to recognize the contributions they each make to health care inefficiencies and unmanageable costs and to adapt those behaviors. Businesses rely on government to set the ground rules of engagement and to properly reallocate resources when necessary. Individuals rely on government to protect their freedom of choice and safety and on businesses to deliver uncompromised quality, and therefore value.

When each party recognizes their contributions to the health care crisis, makes a commitment to stop zero-sum behaviors, and embraces cross-stakeholder cooperation to effect those changes, we will begin to see real change in the system. Our health care system is broken and it will take nothing less than this attitude, cooperation, and willingness to change t

stories recur so frequently in oral and written traditions. Forewarned of the imminent life-destroying flood, Noah sets out to build an ark to save two of each animal, one male and one female, along with members of his immediate family to repopulate the Earth after the flood waters have receded. Although versions vary depending on their source, the basic concept behind the story is similar, which is where I draw my parallels to modern day health care.

For the few months they were together on this relatively small vessel, their collective need to survive the flood trumped their individual needs or desires. The lions could not eat the wildebeests, the humans could not endanger each other, and none of them could damage the ark, or they would all perish. Not that in such close quarters they did not want to harm each other from time to time, but they recognized the simple fact that for any of them to survive, that all of them had to survive.

I imagine such a voyage of cooperation undertaken by government, business, and individuals. One in which they each begin to recognize that their collective fate is intertwined in an inescapable way. The government depends on businesses and individuals to recognize the contributions they each make to health care inefficiencies and unmanageable costs and to adapt those behaviors. Businesses rely on government to set the ground rules of engagement and to properly reallocate resources when necessary. Individuals rely on government to protect their freedom of choice and safety and on businesses to deliver uncompromised quality, and therefore value.

When each party recognizes their contributions to the health care crisis, makes a commitment to stop zero-sum behaviors, and embraces cross-stakeholder cooperation to effect those changes, we will begin to see real change in the system. Our health care system is broken and it will take nothing less than this attitude, cooperation, and willingness to change

ther on this relatively small vessel, their collective need to survive the flood trumped their individual needs or desires. The lions could not eat the wildebeests, the humans could not endanger each other, and none of them could damage the ark, or they would all perish. Not that in such close quarters they did not want to harm each other from time to time, but they recognized the simple fact that for any of them to survive, that all of them had to survive.

I imagine such a voyage of cooperation undertaken by government, business, and individuals. One in which they each begin to recognize that their collective fate is intertwined in an inescapable way. The government depends on businesses and individuals to recognize the contributions they each make to health care inefficiencies and unmanageable costs and to adapt those behaviors. Businesses rely on government to set the ground rules of engagement and to properly reallocate resources when necessary. Individuals rely on government to protect their freedom of choice and safety and on businesses to deliver uncompromised quality, and therefore value.

When each party recognizes their contributions to the health care crisis, makes a commitment to stop zero-sum behaviors, and embraces cross-stakeholder cooperation to effect those changes, we will begin to see real change in the system. Our health care system is broken and it will take nothing less than this attitude, cooperation, and willingness to change

cooperation undertaken by government, business, and individuals. One in which they each begin to recognize that their collective fate is intertwined in an inescapable way. The government depends on businesses and individuals to recognize the contributions they each make to health care inefficiencies and unmanageable costs and to adapt those behaviors. Businesses rely on government to set the ground rules of engagement and to properly reallocate resources when necessary. Individuals rely on government to protect their freedom of choice and safety and on businesses to deliver uncompromised quality, and therefore value.

When each party recognizes their contributions to the health care crisis, makes a commitment to stop zero-sum behaviors, and embraces cross-stakeholder cooperation to effect those changes, we will begin to see real change in the system. Our health care system is broken and it will take nothing less than this attitude, cooperation, and willingness to change

government to protect their freedom of choice and safety and on businesses to deliver uncompromised quality, and therefore value.

When each party recognizes their contributions to the health care crisis, makes a commitment to stop zero-sum behaviors, and embraces cross-stakeholder cooperation to effect those changes, we will begin to see real change in the system. Our health care system is broken and it will take nothing less than this attitude, cooperation, and willingness to change to fix it. No single individual, business, or government body is immune from responsibility and accountability. It will take all of us to build it, stock it with enough provisions for all, safely navigate it, dock it when land makes its triumphant return, and finally disembark from this metaphoric ark.

So as Noah and the other passengers on the ark quickly came to realize, the only option for collective survival is through mutual empathy and self-sacrifice. No matter what our vested interests are in the system as it exists today, we all have more to gain through making small self-sacrifices than we have to lose by making those same sacrifices. The rain has started to fall, and the flood will be upon us soon. Do we have to let it get that bad before we are willing to do something together to stop it before it is too late?