Is Universal Health care too expensive for the US?

Question

All of these countries have Universal Health care:

Argentina, Austria, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Cuba, Costa Rica, Cyprus, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Oman, Portugal, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Sweden, Ukraine and the United Kingdom - all have smaller economies and pull it off.

And Iraq and Afghanistan gets Universal health coverage provided by United States war funding! - not too expensive for your enemies!


Stats

World Health Organisation Rating:
36 Costa Rica
37 United States of America
38 Slovenia

Also, the US ranked 42nd in the world for life expectancy despite spending more on health care per person than any other country.

Answer 1

I don't know a lot about health care in any countries except the U.S. and Argentina. I'm from the U.S. and live in Argentina. I enjoy what I consider to be very acceptable quality of health care here and extremely low cost relative to the U.S. But, I don't believe it is because they have implemented a universal health care system. It's because the average doctor here probably makes in the vicinity of around 20,000 dollars a year or less. Their facilities look more like a grocery store than a modern U.S. hospital. They practice common sense medicine instead of trying to cover their butts for malpractice suits by ordering 15 CAT scans because you have a splinter in your finger. We have an older, very respected doctor that we can call to our house when we're sick and pay him about 50 pesos (around 15 dollars) for a house call. That's cash payment. It doesn't have anything to do with health insurance. And guess what? The doctors here study and work because they actually care about taking care of sick people. It's not just a business. I say all that to say that when comparing health coverage and costs between different countries, there are a lot more factors than just whether or not they've implemented a universal plan.

Answer 2

Exactly. Every other developed country has some kind of universal health care plan, and they all pay half as much for the same level of care (judged either by customer satisfaction or outcomes).



The problem is that Americans say over and over that we want a 'Canadian style' single payer plan where doctors, hospitals and clinics are still private, commercial, and for-profit, but our health insurance industry is so powerful that when a universal coverage plan is proposed it ALWAYS involved perpetuating and reinforcing the existing insurance regime. GHW Bush had a plan, Bill and Hillary had a plan, and both Hilary and Obama had plans during this election, and they all had this feature in common, that the existing insurance companies remained in place, reinforced by huge federal subsidies, and the govt. buys health insurance for -some- uninsured from these companies at their going rates.



So I don't know what it will take to get good universal access to health care in the US. Meanwhile, the price we pay for health coverage has risen 80% since Bush became president, and it was considered a crisis even before that!

Answer 3

It depends on what you mean by "universal healthcare". People talk about it as if its the same in every country. Its not. There is clearly room for improvement in what we're doing now. It ridiculous to spend so much yet have so many people without coverage.

Answer 4

the persons who presently have wellbeing care insurance take a 2d to contemplate this; the fee of your insurance is raised each time somebody with out insurance is going to a wellbeing midsection. merely as shoplifting motives the fee to upward push on your purchase.

Answer 5

What makes you think it works in all these countries? Those that work the best have an obscene tax to pay for it. In Canada and the UK they don't work that well. Canada, for instance, goes bankrupt every year, and they have to refund it. In the UK you have to wait forever for care, and those who "know" somebody get treated first.



Universal health care here would be similar to military health care - same thing, you get treated first by rank. I sat in a waiting room several days for hours on end only to be told to go home and come back the next day, while I watched higher ranking people get served.



You think that the poor will get a fair shake at equal health care - not a chance!!!

Answer 6

maybe they should start with universal food. Shoudl be much simplier and cheaper then universal healthcare