Yonit Shames
Published: December 7, 2005
One of the most memorable campaign ads from the last presidential election was one run by the Bush campaign on the subject of healthcare. The chilling female voiceover warned viewers of ominous healthcare reform plans advocated by the liberals: “Big government in charge. Not you, not your doctor.”
Some lawmakers have indeed proposed some major- and government-mandated- reforms of U.S. healthcare, but the current reality is far more terrifying.
There are 45.5 million uninsured Americans. That means two out of every 10 Americans have no insurance at all. An additional two have insurance that does not cover their medical needs. It has been estimated that 18,000 Americans die annually because they lack coverage.
Want to blame this on laziness or unemployment, as many have done? Think again. Seventy-five percent of the uninsured are either employed full time or the dependents of a full-time worker. Most lack insurance because they simply cannot afford the exorbitant cost.
This trend can’t be blamed on inflation. Medical costs in the U.S. are rising at four or five times that rate. And despite the fact that we pay more than double per capita on healthcare than any other nation, our system is inferior. Bush’s sunny remarks, “Our healthcare system is the envy of the world,” is an ignorant appraisal of a system renowned for its incompetence.
The World Health Organization gave the U.S. healthcare system dismal marks. It is ranked last of all affluent democratic countries and is even behind some developing countries. Furthermore, Americans placed a grim 72nd in overall health, and some experts say that this is due to a lack of preventative care, which is promoted by nationalized health systems.
No one has ever said that there aren’t disadvantages to nationalized healthcare. But the bottom line is that people in countries that provide basic insurance can go to the doctor when they’re sick- a luxury many Americans can’t afford. When they fall ill with terminal diseases, their families don’t have to go into bankruptcy in order to provide them with reasonable care. And the overwhelming majority of people covered by nationalized insurance choose their doctors, specialists and treatment exactly as we do here.
Government-ordered reform is not always the solution to social problems. But free market isn’t either. We’ve tried the free market approach, and the situation has continuously deteriorated.
In fact, it is arguable that the healthcare cost crisis in the U.S. is a direct result of that approach. When a quarter of the money we spend on healthcare goes to administrative costs (the result of hundreds of competing insurance companies) and countless millions go to advertising and executive funds, it is not surprising that healthcare costs are rising at an exorbitant rate.
The U.S., the most affluent nation in the world, lets its citizens be devoured by healthcare costs when they fall victim to illness. In a bitter twist of irony, a nation that spent years arguing the merits of keeping Terry Schiavo alive on machines does not give a damn about the thousands of people who die each year because they simply cannot afford care.
Our healthcare system’s wretched ineptitude will only continue to get worse until it undergoes some major reforms.