The two faces of American Health Care

I am a pretty dumb guy, so when politicians or smart people on TV starts blabbling off about important issues, I never really understand what they are saying. So here I will try to dissect this “health care” issue, so that anyone who is like me, can understand it too.

Laundry List:

Universal Health Care

  1. Everyone deserves equal health care regardless of age or income
  2. We cannot trust companies to be fair and just when our lives are at stakes
  3. Corporations serve the stock holders first, the patient second

Privatized Health Care

  1. Lazy people who do not work are bankrupting our health care system by getting care they do not deserve or need
  2. Corporations can provide better health coverage than a government run bureaucracy
  3. Competition among corporations can lead to faster advance in medical technology, cheaper prices, and better health institutions.

Typical Stories:

Universal Health Care: Shannon was a healthy, constitution loving, non-smoking, hardworking American who recently got cancer. Her health insurance company found a “t” on her paperwork that was not crossed, so they denied her health coverage. Now Shannon has to sell her house and first born to get treatment.

Privatized Health Care: Jane is a mother of four, but she does not know who any of the fathers are. She smokes three packs a day, lives on welfare, and has never paid a penny in tax. Yet she has a car, cable television, cellphones for her and each of her babies, and a brand new Coach purse. One day she ate too much french-fries from McDonalds and got a heart attack. She got taken to the hospital, put in ICU for weeks, and when she left the hospital, she also left her bill for you to pay.

If I am being honest, I have no idea what is the right thing to do. Universal Health Care seems to work very well in other countries, but regardless if it works or not, is it really fair for us to be paying for people like Jane to sit on their a$$? But we also can’t let the insurance companies weasel their way out of providing care to people like our friend Shannon.

However, there are probably many things that we CAN agree on, and should definitely become part of our thought process about health care. ( I got these ideas from other websites )

1) Give incentives to people for loosing/maintaining a healthy weight. Reward good BMI? – We all know that obesity is a “big” problem. If we can reverse the obesity trends, we could potential save “tons” of money. Not to mention, countless lives.

2) Control Tobacco use – I read somewhere that 30% of the cost of our health care system is because of people smoking. If you want to smoke, pay for it yourself!

3) Eliminate unnecessary procedures – In fear of being sued, many hospitals and doctors make you do a lot of frivolous things to make sure they covered all their bases. Who do you think is paying for this?

4) Hold the insurance companies accountable – This is debatable, so I put it last on my list. But the point is, there are TOO MANY stories about people being screwed by their insurance company. I live with this fear everyday of my life. Why do I have to live in fear and I pay my insurance every month and on time?