Thursday, September 18, 2008
Universal health care?
Michael Moore’s documentary Sicko is an examination of our country’s health care crisis. Over 47 million people are currently without insurance, and the people who do have it are not taken care of. Welcome to capitalism. Everything is a commodity from which profit can be made. Even sickness has become a business. Capitalism should have no place in medicine. We are the only industrialized nation that puts profits over people’s basic needs for food, and health care. There are people rejected for health insurance because the insurance company profile of them determines that they might actually get sick. People that need insurance the most are rejected because they would be a loss of profit. Something is truly wrong when the health needs of millions of Americans are secondary to the profits of insurance companies. Insurance carriers only make money by denying claims. However, they must approve just enough claims to appear to be reliable. If they manage to keep the balance, then the insurance company will succeed. If they cannot, then they will perish. Obviously this system of health care as an industry is seriously flawed. Michael Moore proposes wiping out private health insurance and replacing it with a massive federal program; much like the ones already in place in France and England. Take capitalism out of medicine, providing people with health care should not be a profit making scheme. Education is not an industry, so why should basic health needs be? It has been shown to work, so WHAT are we waiting for? This federal program will unfortunately always be shot down by the big CEOs and lobbyists who hold TOO MUCH sway in Washington. People worry about government having too much interference in business, but it seems to me that business has too much interference in government. It seems from the examples of France and England that universal health care works without a huge cost to anyone. Everyone pays what they can, so everyone can get what they need. Big businesses and the extremely wealthy have a problem with this because it would mean that they would have to pay more than others. Why should they sacrifice personal pleasures for a McDonald’s employee to get the same health care they do? The rich in this country tend to think that their money entitles them to things, and that people who do not have money do not deserve the same as them. That unfortunately is the nature of capitalism. Competition apparently extends from the buisness world to include competition for basic needs as well. Under capitalism not everyone can be taken care of, and many people are run over and forgotten about.
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2 comments:
I agree that the sole purpose of capitalism is to make money, and apparently at any cost. For a long time, I have struggled with the thought of how healthcare companies and hospitals could give a $20,000 to a person who is battling life-threatening cancer. However, in order to receive profits they must straddle the line between completely healing and not killing you at the same time. It is so obvious that businesses are so dramatic in rushing to name brand new illnesses that the history of the world had never heard before. For instance, seasonal affective disorder(SAD) is a relatively new disorder linked to depression caused by the onset of colder weather. However, I find it hard to believe that the weather itself causes depression. I can understand that not being able to visit your friends and discuss problems due to a blizzard might bring unhappiness, but can’t see how biologically a snowstorm affects your mood. I also find it disturbing that pharmaceuticals have established the ED sector of there business. Never had they suggested that intimacy problems might be caused troubles in the relationship or stress at work. Nope. They just want you to buy their pills, until a think tank tells you something else is wrong with you that you never knew about, at the expense of your sense of well-being and your wallet.
I never knew that sickness could be turn into business. It is unfortunate that capitalism has made its way into healthcare, especially when healthcare is desperately needed by the really sick and poor people.
But, could we solve this problem by making the government handling all the healthcare issues?
France and England had truly done well with their healthcare issues. Even the elderly are well treated and the amenities for disabled people are well taken care off. I may not have enough knowledge about the current healthcare performance there, but I wonder how do they maintain it? In a more specific word, where do they get the money to maintain it?
If it was by equal tax that is applied to all people of that country, then I have no objection with it. Everyone sacrificed a little to receive the same and equal kind of treatment from the government. What if the money came from extra money the government gain by reducing the wages of public workers? I am not saying they are doing this, but what if that kind of system is applied by our own country just to make the healthcare up to standard? Then, it would still be capitalism, just that not in such an obvious way.
Anyway, maintaining a good healthcare is definitely more important than what money could buy. What is the use of money if we were too sick to spend it? If it was me who would decide what kind of approach I would take, I will make sure that the healthcare provided is adequate for everyone, although by a little bit means of capitalism. Only after that I will figure out an alternative way other than capitalism to support it.
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