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VIDEOHealth Care Reform Opponents Argue, "Go Broke, Don't Fix It"
Time to weaken the Hulk-Hogan-like stranglehold HMOs have on the system.
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You’ve run out of things to do. You spent 30 minutes filling out forms about yourself -- even though you’ve seen this doctor for years. Babies are crying, and the television is tuned to One Life to Live. You’ve read all the 6-month-old issues of Golf Digest and Us Weekly, done the crossword puzzle, and even cleaned out your cell phone’s text-message inbox.
And you’re only there for a routine checkup. Heaven forbid you had a major problem -- remember the last time you had to wait overnight in the emergency room? You wish you could turn around and walk out, but this is the one doctor your HMO will cover. Otherwise you'd have to pay a wallet-busting fee.
You think to yourself: There has to be a better way.
But this is the American health-care system -- and for some strange reason, the Obama administration wants to reform it.
But not everyone agrees. Health insurers, from Aetna (AET), to United Health (UNH) to Humana (HUM) to CIGNA (CIG) to HealthSpring (HS) -- are none too pleased. Others say the evils of socialized medicine are threatening the US like a red tide creeping into a beautiful coral reef.
Were meaningful reform of the health-care system -- if it includes a public plan -- to pass, America would become (gasp) the same as France, England, Canada, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and the rest of the developed world.
Arizona Senator Jon Kyl: “I don’t want America to begin rationing care to their citizens in the way these other countries do.”
Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele: “[President Obama] is conducting a dangerous experiment with our health care.”
So what does that experiment include? Well, let’s compare “what these countries do” -- as the Arizona Senator says -- to the US.
First off, everybody has insurance. It's a guaranteed right. How silly is that: Who would want health care they get for free?
There are shorter lines in emergency rooms and it's easier to see a primary-care doctor. There's little paperwork -- for both patients and physicians -- and those physicians say they feel free to practice medicine the way they want.
The newspapers in those countries don't include stories of people going bankrupt or skipping medical care because it costs too much. And overall, they pay substantially less than we do. For instance, the French spend around 11% of their gross domestic product on health care, the Dutch around 10%. In the US, we spend around 16%
In other words, people in these countries receive timely, quality care. A nightmare indeed.
At least we have our uniqueness. Unlike all other developed nations, the US believes health care isn't a fundamental right. We spend more than any other country and have more uninsured -- about 50 million -- than any other country.
Health-care costs are likely to double in 10 years in a system that's already broken. Rising premiums sap income that could be used for better purposes. In our country, the status quo is the most dangerous position.
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