My position is (like RP’s) that government regulation of the Health Care industry is the root of all the problems related to HC reform (if we would get rid of the regulation, no one would be claiming that we need the reform). My opponent is pro-regulation and is to the point of asking me direct questions about how the unregulated free market would offer better solutions than the following regulations: isolation of communicable disease, public sanitation, drinking water standards, sterilization of medical and dental instruments, purity of pharmaceutical products, sewage and waste water treatment, standardized testing of medical professionals and inspection of hospitals, insisting that hospitals use disposable needles. While I have previously given him the standard theory of how regulation serves to encourage incompetence (by reducing small-business competition), I thought it wise to consult this forum for possible responses to the above questions.