America spends two and a half times more on healthcare per capita than any other developed nation, quickly approaching $3 trillion EVERY year. With this kind of expenditure, you would expect our citizens to be the healthiest in the world, but this is not the case.…
Thursday September 19th Film and Discussion: Sick Around the World Reading Assignment: The Secret Epidemic, Pp. 57-125…
Globally speaking, the US is regarded as a major player in the affairs of the world. As a major world power of the modern age, we lead the world into the future, and with a leading economy, and a reputation as a wealthy and advanced civilization, the facts about our expenses in the realm of healthcare are very surprising.…
Dr. Don Berwick, Head of Medicare/Medicaid 2010-2011 whom talks about how unsustainable the healthcare system is. We’re spending almost twice as much in America as any other country on earth. Yearly, we have been spending $2.7 trillion in healthcare. The average per capita cost of healthcare in the developed world is about $3,000, but in the United States, it was around $8,000 annually, more than double. Due to these astronomical amounts, healthcare has not become affordable anymore. Insurance companies are raising their rates they are charging for premiums, covering less on patient care, which in turns takes even more money out of our pockets because we now not only have to pay the premiums, but are now left with the portion of the care given that we must pay for out of our pockets.…
Before reading the book The Healing of America by T.R. Reid, I was completely uneducated and unaware of the health care systems that other countries use all over the world. I had never really taken into consideration the millions of people in who have little or no health insurance at all and how much it effective them. Every country in the world devises its own set of arrangements for meeting the three basic goals of a health care system. These include keeping people healthy, treating the sick and protecting families against financial ruin from medical bills. There are four main models of health care systems that Reid describes in the book that include, the Bismarck model, Beveridge model,…
Michael Moore’s documentary, Sicko is a very controversial yet entertaining and emotionally compelling film. The documentary draws attention to several flaws in the health care system in United States of America. It exposes how profit-based healthcare insurance companies in America exploit the people; and argues that for the people of America, socializing healthcare would be much better than the current system. The controversy of the film is restricted to those whose interest would be affected, that is, Profits of insurance companies where universal healthcare is accepted would suffer greatly, and so would investors and corporations. He travels to other parts of the world such as Canada, Cuba, France and the United Kingdom to show that yes, indeed-universal healthcare does work well in other countries. He does well in using emotional appeal, guilt and humor to articulate how there is conflict in the American healthcare system between profit maximization and the desire to provide good quality and affordable health care for all. While Michael uses logical and ethical appeals to show how healthcare systems in France, United Kingdom, Cuba and Canada are better than the United States of America, his use of emotional appeal seems to be most effective.…
These past five weeks have been a true eye opening experience I always knew that there were so many people who were uninsured or underinsured. Over these past five weeks I have learned so much about the healthcare industry and what is happening in the world around us. Many people tend to be blind when it comes down to the issues at hand. I fall into the statistic when it comes to being uninsured or not having enough coverage, it discourages people to seek the treatment that they need because they are scared of what is going to happen or if they are going to receive proper care like every other individual or treated differently because they don’t have insurance or money to pay it can be as simple as not being able to afford the treatment itself. I chose this particular topic to write my final assignment because I can honestly say that I can relate to this issue and it is a serious problem that has been facing Americans for a while now.…
Health care system in the United States is on an unsustainable way and in need of transformation. Even if, it has both private and public insurers like in other countries but the uniqueness of this system is dominant of the private component. The United States spends more on health care than any other nation but the nation is less healthy than the average population in other developed countries. Additionally, many people stay uninsured and do not have access to health care.…
For the past decades, politicians and insurance companies could carelessly proclaim that the United States had the best healthcare system in the world, but as its major deficiencies have become more apparent many people have found it harder to accept this claim. It is reported that around 59 million Americans are without health insurance and are aware that our health care system does not work for everyone. This has caused a growing recognition that the major problems of rising costs and lack of access constitute a real crisis. However, the search solutions have not been easy or clear cut. The problems of our health care system have been responded to with various makeshift solutions rather than analyzing the system itself as a whole to take…
hold insurance companies accountable. The most important parts of the law are features described in the following discussion. Because of space limitation, I will highlight some elements of the law that are enacted through…
I say healthcare with quotations because it’s not really healthcare, it’s more sick care. Like a physician in the film said “We have a disease care system, it doesn’t want you to die and it doesn’t want you to get well” because the longer you stay sick and in need of treatment, Insurance companies continue making money. One of the issues with American healthcare is the prevention to problem solving ratio, people are treated, at least temporarily, for issues and illness that could have been easily prevented or even reversed with the right diet and activity level while saving billions. I visited http://www.commonwealthfund.org to find out how Americas health care compared to other countries and found “Data from the OECD show that the U.S. spent 17.1 percent of its gross domestic product (GDP) on health care in 2013. This was almost 50 percent more than the next-highest spender (France, 11.6% of GDP) and almost double what was spent in the U.K. (8.8%). U.S. spending per person was equivalent to $9,086”. If we as a people were to take better care of our bodies and overall being their wouldn’t be as much need for dangerous medication and these big insurance corporations who are making their rates as high as they want and getting away with it. One healthcare salesman from the movie actually stated that “You almost forget it’s real people and their health you’re dealing with, not just money and numbers”. Many…
It makes you aware of how the healthcare system in the United States needs improvement. In the U.S., 47 million people have no coverage and thousands go bankrupt just trying to receive medical treatment. However, in other countries this is unheard of in healthcare. One of the downfalls in Great Britain is having to wait to get elective surgeries which can take up to 18months. This is unheard of in the United States, but it comes with a price. In other countries, the insurance companies and the doctors are not becoming rich or making a profit. The price of a hospital stay shocked me. For one night is in Japan, it cost ten dollars for a private room. This is unheard of in the United States. As a family that is paying payments on healthcare bills, it is a big issue when seeing how other countries operate their healthcare system. Government in healthcare is not the answer but, improvements need to be made in this broken…
“Thirty-two of the thirty-three largest developed countries have some form of universal healthcare coverage”; we are the exception (www.who.int/en/). The United States healthcare costs are the highest of all developed nations, as well as the highest death rate for people who are uninsured. Healthcare has always been a for profit industry in America. The industry has maintained record profits each year while more people face financial ruin because of their healthcare costs. Healthcare costs are the leading cause of bankruptcy in the United States, and there continues to be many families on the verge of filing. Healthcare costs cannot be managed by middle/lower class individuals in the United States. The private market has failed to provide affordable access as well as quality of care; Universal Healthcare will provide preventable care, access without having to pay, and peace of mind to American citizens. We currently offer two federal/state programs to help those who need healthcare coverage: Medicare, for those sixty-five years of age and above, and Medicaid for low income people/families. Both of these programs cover medical costs, but they do not cover all medical costs or preventable care. Our country needs to eliminate these two programs and…
According to the U.S. Census Bureau in 2005 approximately 44 million people were not covered by any means of insurance, which made up about 15% of the United States population. In more recent estimates, the number has grown to about 60 million; witch would be about 18% considering the increase in population size. With numbers this great healthcare reform is needed, but, the big push at this time is Universal health care also known as a single payer system. Single payer systems are big in European countries and Canada, but it would be tough to judge if they really work, if you were to ask ten people in those countries if the system worked you would get ten different answers.…
America currently is not the world leader when it comes to the health and well being of our citizens or the quality of treatment. Switzerland is the world leader when it comes to health insurance. This is mainly because it has a universal healthcare program, allowing more patients to be treated. The United States would save an average of $189.5 billion if a universal healthcare system is established. A universal program could have a rather large impact in both these areas. This would enable medical staffers to be able to concentrate on the health and well being of each individual and less around liability, malpractice and insurance procedures. A program like this should reduce healthcare costs. Countries with universal healthcare spend millions…