U.S. President Barack Obama has stated he wants American health care to remain in private rather than public hands. He wants to bring down costs and extend full coverage to every U.S. citizen. He has to have the support of Congress for any reforms he might want to institute and that won’t be easy.
Enormously Expensive Medical System
On a per capita basis, and in total, the U.S. spends more on health care than any other nation. According to the White House, “The United States spent approximately $2.2 trillion on health care in 2007, or $7,421 per person - nearly twice the average of other developed nations.”
The cost of employer-sponsored insurance premiums has doubled over the last nine years: “This forces families to sit around the kitchen table to make impossible choices between paying rent or paying health premiums.” It has also caused many smaller companies to simply give up offering health care as an employee benefit.
And, unless something is done, the American system is going to get more expensive. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that by 2025 one out of every four dollars of American GDP will be tied up in the health system. At present, the ratio is one in every six dollars.
Personal Financial Burden of Health Costs in U.S.
As reported by Dr. Sanjay Gupta on CNN (January 30, 2008), “The Number One cause of personal bankruptcy in the United States is unpaid medical bills. As we found, it is not just the uninsured, but also the underinsured.”
Michael Moore documented some horror stories about people with health insurance problems in his 2007 movie “Sicko.” There are thousands if not millions more of people who have lost everything because of the cost of health care in the U.S. and many of their stories can be found at Health Care Stories for America. A lot of these tragedies are among people who have health care insurance.
Those who are not insured receive care that is way less extensive than those who are insured. According to a recent estimate by the Urban Institute, the lack of health insurance leads to 27,000 preventable deaths in America each year.
U.S. Health Outcomes not very Good
Given that Americans spend vastly more than anybody else on health they should enjoy better medical care. They don’t.
In its June 27, 2009 issue, The Economist reported that, “…infant mortality, life expectancy, and survival-rates for heart attacks are all worse than the OECD average. Meanwhile, because health insurance is so expensive, nearly 50 million Americans, an obscene number in such a rich place, have none…”
The Cost to America Goes Beyond Inadequate Health Coverage
The heart-rending stories of those who cannot get the care they need are only part of the story. The high cost of the American medical system hurts the nation’s competitiveness.
The Economist sums up a couple of the problems in its leader “This is Going to Hurt”: “private insurance schemes are a huge problem for employers: the cost of health insurance helped bring down GM…[also] expensive premiums depress workers’ wages.”
U.S. President Barack Obama faces a huge challenge if he is to reform the delivery of medical services. A poll released on July 1, 2009 by CNN/Opinion Research Corporation shows 51 percent of people say they favour Obama’s plan. Once the vested interests who stand to lose under a different system start their lobbying and media campaigns that slim majority might disappear.
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