By now, you may be getting tired of the long lists of complaints each of our major political parties has about the other. Every day brings a new litany of outrage and fear, and certainty that our nation will be lost forever if the “other side” gets its way.
It’s not that these issues aren’t important and valid, but often the only place they lead is to more opposition, more attacks, more extremism. It’s time that each of us invested some time in creating a vision of what we want our country to become, not what we don’t want it to become.
I’d like to help you think about some of the significant issues without a focus on who has the right answer (in fact, many of us don’t even have an answer, we just don’t like how things are).
Let’s start with healthcare. It’s particularly on my mind as I’m less than a week out from total hip replacement surgery, and I have the freedom to focus on healing because I’m covered by traditional Medicare, along with a supplemental policy that pays for the part that Medicare does not. For a total monthly premium of less than $450 for both policies, I have virtually no medical bills to pay as long as I seek care from providers who accept Medicare, which includes almost all of them.
I also had the peace of mind of knowing I was being treated in a well-rated facility by welltrained and experienced surgeons. My follow-up and physical therapy visits are covered as well. I’m excited to know that I will soon be back to the level of active daily functioning that I had enjoyed before arthritis got the best of me.
I have tried to imagine what I would have done if I had not had this clear and straightforward path to treatment and recovery. What if I were uninsured, or had lost my job and my insurance along with it? What if I had had to drop my coverage because I couldn’t afford the monthly premiums? Does a person deserve to receive better treatment because they have more money?
It’s not like the US healthcare system is a paragon of quality and efficiency as it is; we spend far more per person than other developed countries without consistently achieving better health outcomes. Yet political competition results in people not even being able to consider the pros and cons of alternatives.
Let’s consider our closest neighbor, Canada. Universal healthcare at little or no charge when care is received. Families do not have to decide whether they can afford basic health coverage.
“Socialism!” is the immediate response that can end the conversation before it begins. Does anyone even know what they mean by that word? The public part of the Canadian healthcare system is financing and administering coverage; the doctors are not government employees, the hospitals are largely independent nonprofits, and patients choose their own physicians. The part left out of the Canadian system is the self-created work of insurance companies building networks, setting different fee schedules, designing products, and competing with other companies to market those products, all of which adds administrative cost without directly contributing to patient care.
“Who’s gonna pay for that?” is the next question, especially from the conservatives who pride themselves on watching for government waste. It seems we are already paying enormous amounts into our healthcare system, so the question may not be finding the money as much as deciding whether to spend it through thousands of competing insurance plans or through one streamlined payment system. Much of the money is being spent already.
A single-payer system is not perfect. It does not solve supply and demand problems having to do with the pipeline for educating and training providers, which can result in longer delays in receiving non-emergency care. But this issue is related to a capacity decision about how much healthcare a nation wishes to support, not to how the claims will be paid.
I’m not saying universal healthcare is the right answer, but I’m asking you to give it some thought as an idea, not as some radical political uprising that will turn us all into communists. If you simply think in terms of the comparative investments involved in our current system and a Canadian-type system, would you prefer to invest in the health, productivity and stability of all our citizens? Can you see how that forms a direct line of growth into the health of our country?
Are you happy with a country that “saves” money by making healthcare difficult or impossible to obtain for people who cannot afford it? Does that seem like a smart investment in our future? When there are other viable, and likely better, options, is that the kind of country you want?
Susan Hull is a retired clinical psychologist, a horse trainer, and an independent voter. She hurts for those who lack access to good medical care when they or their families need it. It doesn’t have to be this way.
.png)
