Health Care

It looks like the tide is turning against Obama and his health care plan. Could it be that the bill is too ambitions at 1200 pages. Does something that long invite criticism? Well I certainly do not know all the details about his health care plan, but I do have some thoughts, generally.

--48 million Americans do not have health insurance. In a nation this wealthy that just seems wrong. We'll pay for every child to have access to a teacher but not a doctor?

--1 in 25 dollars spent on health services goes to prevention. Why? There are a couple reason. One is that it is simply more expensive to offer chemo therapy than to run a biopsy on a questionable colored mole. Another is that people without insurance have no choice but to wait until it is an emergency before they an get any help. It is more cost effective to prevent illness, but that is not how our current system works. So if you are poor (and like 1/6 of Americans cannot afford insurance) and have a dark mole that is changing colors, it may be cancerous but you can't have it looked until its too late and you need chemotherapy. Clearly our system is in need of reform.

--Currently doctors get paid for conducting tests and providing services--not getting results. The same criticism republicans have for public education (teachers get paid regardless of how good or bad they are) is equally fitting for the health care industry. A good friend of mine had to have a hearth-catheter (they stick a mini-camera up an artery and into your heart to take measurements). The hospital billed her for two within two days because the doctor forgot to get a couple measurements and had to do it again. Shouldn't the second one come out of his salary? Then, of course, insurance companies can make even more money by denying claims for people who get too expensive (and I've also seen this first hand so I know it happens). Keep in mind the health care system was built by health care companies, and like any business thier goal was and is to make money. Providing a service to make money is not bad, but we need to always remember that they only provide as much service as we demand, and if we don't threaten regulation (or use it) they'll never self-regulate--that would just be bad business.

--Those "socialist" nations in Europe and to our north have great service. All this bad-talking social health care is a smoke screen--ask anybody who has ever lived there and they'll tell you they get service equal to a typical insured American. It takes a couple months to get into a specialist, just like it does here in the states (and if you have an emergency they get you in faster, just like here in the states). And in Canada, at least, if you need some incredibly unusual treatment or specialist that they cannot provide in the window of need, they'll pay for you to go to the States (where the massive population can support a greater number of specialists offering that treatment). People foolishly think Canadians come to the states to access our "better" health care system; the fact is that they prefer their health care and the only ones who come down are either (1) wealthy people trying to skip ahead of some organ transplant waiting list (should your cash allow you to skip ahead of somebody else?), or (2) people who need a service that Canada cannot offer in time because they lack the population to support the unusual treatment. They do not come to the states because our system is better; quite the opposite, they come because (1) our system is screwed up and we privileged the wealthy at the expense of the poor (no amount of $$$ should allow somebody to skip ahead of other human beings waiting for a transplant) and (2) because we have a larger population to support more diverse treatments.

So I don't know all about the Obama health care plan, but I do know that our system needs dramatic reform. When you toss in the fact that premiums are constantly doubling and American families will soon be unable to afford any coverage it becomes clear that we need a public option. In capitalism there are always winners and loosers; haves and have-nots. When it comes to health care, we should all have some, regardless of our income level. Instead, we see the progressive restriction of who can afford insurance that will just continue to grow the ranks of have-nots. That is unacceptable.

Oh, and one more thing about "a public option." I'm sick of republicans (like my dad) insisting that "the government will take over the industry, subsidize itself, and run out all of the competition." When has the government ever done that? It is a scare tactic. The government never has been in the business of taking over an industry and chasing out all of the private enterprise. Look at the postal system--we have lots of options (US postal, Fed Ex, UPS, DHL)--and it could be the same in health care. We do need a public option to (1) provide for those who cannot afford the ever-rising premiums, and (2) to keep the current health care providers honest. My own best solution would be for each state to have its own public option, and be permitted to use the facilities of neighboring states to compete across state lines with those neighbors (to ensure that the various state-run public options have competition as well)--competition keeps everybody honest--the government and private enterprise.