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[DreamPipEr]

Cyan's Casual Conversation thread on whether we have health insurance got me thinking about the idea of Universal Health Care in the US.

Nighttimer made the following remarks:

To my mind the right to health and healthcare is a fundamental and basic human right.  The fact that 44 million Americans are without healthcare is a national shame and scandal.

http://covertheuninsuredweek.org/media/doc...ease050504.php3
http://www.everybodyinnobodyout.org/FAQ/fq...htm#thatserious
http://www.pbs.org/healthcarecrisis/uninsured.html

Bush's inaction on this issue for the last four years is one of my primary reasons to oppose his reelection.   I couldn't disagree more with you Dontreadonme.
The American people deserve healthcare coverage just as good as our leaders in Congress receive.

For anyone who thinks national healtcare is too risky to implement I hope you always have insurance if your child wakes up at 2:00 a.m. with a temperature over 100 degrees and all you have in the house is a half-empty bottle of Robitussen.

Julian said:

I checked "other", since I live in Britain so I am covered by the National Health Service. I pay for it out of my taxes, but it is free at the point of delivery.

The constraint on resources means that sometimes I might need to wait a while for an appointment - perhaps a day or two to see my GP, or an hour or two if I visit a hospital ER without a real emergency. For elective surgery I might need to wait up to six months depending on where I live and what condition I have (This used to be potentially much longer, but the current government has tried hard to cut waiting times. Sometimes the emphasis has been too much on this and not enough on quality of care, but that tends to be the exception rather than the rule.)

I'd guess that over 90% of patients have a completely satisfactory experience, which most likely compares favourably with the private US system. And all this happens on a rather smaller percentage of GDP invested in healthcare than the USA.

Mrs. P said:

Bush's inaction on this issue for the last four years is one of my primary reasons to oppose his reelection.   I couldn't disagree more with you Dontreadonme.
The American people deserve healthcare coverage just as good as our leaders in Congress receive.

We would go bankrupt if we transitioned to universal health care and didn’t adopt the no-fault style policies of Europe with them, and I would certainly not look to Kerry to change any of this. The primary spokesperson on behalf of the trial lawyers is the "Center for Justice and Democracy”, heavily funded by the trial bar, whose president is Joanne Doroshow (a Naderite), and was started with seed money by Michael Moore, who is on the board. Which candidate do you think this group endorses? And Edwards his running mate? Some of Edwards's biggest wins came from cases suing doctors, hospitals, and insurance companies for medical malpractice.

There might be a lot of talk and “feel your pain” sentiments during the next four years if Kerry becomes president, maybe even a team of 500 lawyers paid to analyze the possibilities (sound familiar?), but nothing will truly be done to cover American healthcare, and no measures toward tort reform (the root of the problem), will be made.

Questions for debate:
1. Do you support an effort for Universal Health Care (UHC) system in the US?
2. How realistic is the concept of UHC system in the US? Why or Why not?
3. What are the pros and cons of UHC in the States?