Alabama learns a lesson in unintended consequences

Last week, the Alabama State Committee of Public Health repealed a three-decades-old regulation requiring dialysis clinics to be located within 10 miles of a hospital.

(Mobile Register) Gov. Bob Riley and state health officer Dr. Don Williamson hailed the rule change as a great step in improving health care in the rural areas of the state, particularly the Black Belt, a band of rural, sparesely populated land stretching across about a dozen counties in the south-central part of the state.

Under the new change, dialysis clinics can open anywhere in the state, regardless of proximity to a hospital. That means some rural residents might be able to avoid having to cross county lines multiple times each week for the life-saving procedure.

I'm sure that the government officials who enacted this regulation back in 1975 had good intentions. They always do. But, the long-term consequences should have been predictable.

(Birmingham News)...in practice, the rule turned out to be more of a danger to patients than having clinics located far away from hospitals. It placed a terrible burden on people in rural communities without hospitals - requiring them to take long trips, sometimes by ambulance, to a distant dialysis center.

Why did it take so long for state officials to figure out that this particular regulation was doing more harm than good? More generally, how many other regulations like this one are still on the books, unnecessarily restraining the invisible hand of the free market from working its magic?