Is healthcare a right or a privilege? Is healthcare for profit a sin? Is the healthcare issue more complex or is it really just a simple, black/white right/wrong matter? Is it capitalism vs socialism? Be sure to visit Ramana's Musing
The good old USA boasts the highest healthcare cost in the world, a 3.66 trillion dollar industry with over $10,000 per person being spent. Healthcare accounts for about 18% of our GDP, according to CMS.gov . And the bang or our buck? We have the lowest life expectancy and highest infant mortality rate in a group of high income western nations - including the U.K., Canada, Germany, Australia, Japan, Sweden, France, Denmark, the Netherlands, and Switzerland.
With that backdrop, healthcare is clearly an expensive proposition - something on which everyone cam agree. Is it a right? I checked the Bill of Rights - no mention of healthcare so it must not be a right. See for yourself - Bill of Rights.
Take a closer look at the numbers and you will find that the main drivers of the cost differential between the USA and those other countries and it gets more interesting. We use the same amount of services, visit doctors and hospitals at the same rate as people in those other countries but administrative costs and prescription costs in the USA are significantly higher. Those costs account for the difference in spending. The price of medicine in the USA is often in the news - especially when a company suddenly increases the cost of their product by hundreds if not thousands of percentage points. For example, the cost of insulin nearly doubled between 2012 and 2016. Whew. That is a healthy leap but we have to pay for all that research and development - right? Think again. Eli Lilly - the company that first produced insulin made 1.7 Billion dollars on its most popular version of insulin a full 12 years after it was introduced. And mind you - to a diabetic it is usually take insulin or die. Unfortunately often that turns into a choice - food or insulin.
Again - is healthcare a right or a privilege? Knowing that one person's right to healthcare is anothers burden to pay seems to point to the notion that healthcare is a privilege. Everyone needs to take care of themselves. Working people should not be required to pay for healthcare for those who choose not to work. It is simply not fair - is it?
I believe basic healthcare service is a right everyone should enjoy. That basic healthcare should include annual checkups, vaccinations etc.. Wellness should be the focus. That does not mean it should be free. It is worth noting that the reason Medicare is acceptable to some who might otherwise be considered conservative, Medicare is not a government provided entitlement - everyone contributes to the Medicare costs when they work, along with their employer. The government essentially becomes a state run insurance provider. I have been on Medicare for almost 5 years. My policy is provided by Aetna. That should be put in place literally at the time a SS number is acquired. Individuals should make contributions at work just as they do today (but not necessarily the same rate). Employers would continue making contributions as well. Just as currently offered, private companies should be encouraged to offer policies should they choose to enter the market. Prescription drug prices should be negotiated and reviewed periodically. Policies should be transportable so changing jobs does not cause a lapse in protection.
We have a moral obligation to care for the less fortunate members of our society. They should have have medical coverage provided.
Not all medical procedures should be considered a right. Some should be privileges offered to anyone willing to pay for them. Separate policies could be offered that individuals pay for on their own.
There will be people who say Medicare and Medicaid are entitlements that we can no longer offer, they are leading us down the path toward socialism., be they brightest of red conservative I know of nobody willing to give up their medicare coverage. Not a single individual. Private companies already carve out slices of the Medicare pie - that my friends is capitalism.
Obviously things are not entirely black and white when it comes to healthcare and it is up to us and our elected officials to resolve the issue. It is time for Congress to pull up their big boy/big girl pants and do the job we hired them for - to govern. Resistors should be fired.
That's it for this week's 2-on-1 blog. See ya next week.
Bar the details due to our being in different countries, we are in agreement that it is a right. Enough said.
ReplyDeleteHealthcare costs are no different than Home Owners Insurance. We all pay for the costs and damages incurred by others in Hurricanes, Floods and disasters. Citizenry already had asserted that they don't mind paying for the hardships of others, as long as they get what is coming to them if the need ever arises. IF healthcare over time is only a privilege that can be given to those that can afford it, our Country and our citizens will have become morally bankrupt. Can you imagine walking by the dead on the sidewalks downtown, or by your Hospital as the lay on the grounds, and simply ignoring it, such as they do in North Korea? That is now what this country is about at all. We despise the North Koreans and how they treat their citizens, and yet we are willing to let that happen right here in our own Country?
ReplyDeleteThis wealthy nation has the resources to provide free healthcare for all whether or not people see it as a right, so I support doing so. How wonderful it would be if people could simply concentrate on getting well if they didn’t have to cope with paying for their healthcare. There are some major issues which must be prevented from occurring with government one-payer systems as has been a problem elsewhere. One is a generalization of care sometimes described as a “cookie-cutter” approach, or “one size fits all”, based on groupings such as by age rather than being individualized. Another: surgeries delayed solely on the basis of type that have been arbitrarily classified as non-emergency despite the fact such delay results in the development of a worsening condition with permanently decreased function. Also, most recently funding of such a system has not been forthcoming impairing the delivery of services as I’ve read from several sources has occurred in at least one country. Clearly, accountability must be established and enforced as I think of issues surrounding veterans care in our own country that have surfaced and been present for many years.
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