Most things you're talking about are either end-of-life care type of stuff like cancer, or something rare like Cystic Fibrosis. - Typical procedures used for c

Most things you're talking about are either end-of-life care type of stuff like cancer, or something rare like Cystic Fibrosis. - Typical procedures used for common infections, broken bones, etc. don't require anything much that wasn't around 50 years ago. - You might say: CT scanners, MRIs, etc, but the reason these are expensive is market structure (i.e. someone will pay for it...), not a fundamental engineering reason - i.e. the MRI isn't required to be made form gold. Also note that this is one of the few (only?) industries where the same device w/ same features increases in price over time - because of monopolistic shit from patents, FDA barriers, etc.