Universal Health Care Essay

Health Care is a widely used system among many countries. Some countries have the right to universal coverage such as Taiwan, Japan, Switzerland, United Kingdom, and Germany. Unfortunately the United States does not receive universal coverage for health insurance. There are many benefits and downfalls in our current Health Care system called the Affordable Care Act that is fulfilling the role in which most want to be universal health care.
The Affordable Health Care act is helping many in ways that we have never seen before. Tens of millions of uninsured people will get access to affordable, high-quality health insurance through Medicaid expansion, their employers, and the Health Insurance Marketplace. Obamacare ensures you that you can’t
be dropped from coverage when you get sick or make an honest mistake on your application. You also can’t be denied coverage or treatment for being sick or get charged more for being sick. Additionally, you can’t be charged more for being a woman. Other protections ensure that you have the right to a rapid appeal, that health insurance companies can’t make any rate hikes randomly at certain times. Children are allowed to stay under their parent's plan until the age of 26 as well making it easier for kids to get through college and concentrate on their studies. Obamacare has lead to many people being insured over the years that it has been around. It has helped many significantly and made families strive again.
Obamacare isn't all that great for the people in this country. In order to get the money to help insure all these people, there are new taxes that had to come about, mostly on high-earners and the healthcare industry. The taxes that may affect you directly are the individual mandate and the employer mandate. The individual mandate requires individuals not covered by employer or government sponsored insurance plans to maintain minimal health insurance coverage or pay a penalty fee. The employer mandate on the other hand is the requirement of employers with fifty or more employees to provide health coverage to those employees and set a minimum baseline of coverage and employer contributions. Also insurance companies now must cover sick people without any excuses, and this increases the cost of everyone’s insurance. Medicaid expanded using Federal and State funding. Not all States have to expand Medicaid and the states that have chosen not to expand Medicaid leave 5.7 million of our nation's poorest people without coverage options. Some Medicare payments to doctors and hospitals have been limited; Medicare pays doctors more than any other type of coverage, and these rates have led to very complex problems that are driving the costs of health care up for everyone. Obamacare has affected many people and not in such good ways. The current health care system is not working as well as we may think it is.
15.4% of the US population did not have health insurance in the year 2012 according to the Census Bureau.
The US and Mexico are the only countries of the thirty four member of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), that do not have universal health coverage. Those in favor of the health care system state that no one in the richest nation on earth should go without health care. It is believed that it would put an end to medical bankruptcies. Many people are struggling in the united states due to the huge lump sum of medical bills because they are not covered by insurance. Also there's an idea that making it universal would improve public health overall. Many do not go and see doctors because they can't afford to see one due to not having any insurance coverage making people more ill. There is the idea that it will help small businesses strive further and even reduce the overall health care spending. We see in the documentary, Sick Around America, that all the people who are suffering from injuries and illnesses are in massive debt due to all the medical bills that are thrown at them. There is an insurance for health care called medical underwriting health care which avoids those with illnesses so the company doesn't have to pay for them. This company makes it harder for people to receive insurance because it can be such a simple illness that makes them not applicable for health care. We need universal health care or we will have people struggling all over to protect themselves and even watch their loved ones struggle and not do anything about
it.