Game over: The collateral damage in American healthcare

More than 44,000 people die each year in America simply because they lack the ability to pay for healthcare. The collateral damage of a broken system now numbers in the tens of thousands of American lives lost because the American government cannot agree that healthcare is a human right, and politicians play meaningless games of legislative strategy with their constituents and donors.

It is time for all Americans to demand that their elected officials pass legislation ensuring healthcare for every citizen. Thanks to the internet, Americans have access to more information today and a louder public voice than ever before. It is time to engage. Change is coming, and no one will be unaffected.

In a country of abundance and opportunity, there still exists a stigma against the poor that is deeply ingrained in the fabric of American culture. Some still live in ignorance about the truths of a life lived in poverty, the truths of the financial capabilities of the working poor. These are the people who are aghast at those who will not just “pull themselves up by their bootstraps” and succeed in a world where the odds are stacked against them from birth. Many Americans also live in ignorance of the fact that a for-profit healthcare system exists only in this country, and that despite the enormous expense of this system, it is the least effective healthcare on the planet. Many Americans are also ignorant of the fact that just having insurance does not guarantee care. Unfortunately, even good insurance still requires additional payment to doctors and hospitals for services rendered.

This issue has turned into a bad partisan reality show, with the current administration desperately trying to make good on campaign promises to repeal the successful reform efforts of the prior administration. After more than 70 failed attempts to repeal and/or replace “Obamacare”, officially known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) since its adoption in 2010, the Republican-controlled Senate could not garner enough support to bring their most recent bill to a vote. Proponents and beneficiaries of the ACA breathed a sigh of relief as the deadline to introduce further legislation passed, only to be blindsided by a recent executive order intended to sabotage the entire program and cause millions to lose their coverage.

Logic dictates that with an ever-growing American population and the Baby Boomer generation aging into senior adulthood, the current hybrid of the existing government-sponsored programs such as Medicare and Medicaid along with privatized for-profit plans will eventually fail due to the sheer volume of patients needing care.

Logic also dictates that without some kind of health coverage, uninsured citizens will continue to sicken without treatment until they end up in an overflowing emergency room in crisis, and then American taxpayers foot the bill for expensive critical care that could have been averted by access to early preventative care and early detection of disease or illness. It makes no fiscal sense to continue to function under this model.

It should be concerning that the cost of American healthcare is nearly 10 times that of the next closest comparable system. This can be attributed to waste and inefficiency, but also to the lack of preventative care and the higher complexity of patients with poorly managed chronic diseases. Additionally, these factors put America dead last on every list concerning healthcare quality and outcome measures.

How can readers make the greatest impact on this issue? First, by voting and ensuring that everyone they know has also voted. It counts.

Secondly, readers need to know who their elected officials are and what their position is on healthcare reform. Contact them daily using multiple methods; social media mentions, emails, letters or faxes, or old-fashioned phone calls. Every letter, every call and every comment is read and recorded. Either thank them for supporting a single-payer healthcare plan, or demand that they cease efforts to repeal and replace the ACA and instead support House Resolution 676 and Senate Bill S.1804. Both Congress and the Senate have active legislation on the floor to expand Medicare services and make Americans of all ages eligible for Medicare.

And finally, readers should take a moral stand when they hear this issue discussed at school, at work or at home. They should not shy away from a reasonable discussion on this matter. There are plenty of non-partisan sites to use to research all of the data related to this issue. Some reputable sources of healthcare statistics and data are The Pew Research Center or The Kaiser Family Foundation, and for non-partisan news, Reuters or The Associated Press.

Perhaps the single greatest moral offense in the equation is the belief of many people that the inability to afford healthcare means the poor are not trying hard enough to be successful. Or the belief that social programs that provide assistance, such as the tax subsidies built into the ACA that allowed millions of people to afford coverage for the first time, are “handouts” that people do not deserve. Proponents of privatized systems still claim that forcing patients to pay for a portion of their care is teaching them responsibility.

It is not the government’s job to grant or withhold aid based on how politicians personally judge the citizens of this country. But healthcare has become just that…a commodity to be negotiated. It represents the threat of financial ruin for being diagnosed with cancer, the loss of a lifetime of savings to recover from a terrible accident. Single-payer opponents are quick to claim that other countries have long waits for care, but people in this country are paying to wait.

The political game is over. Recent polls show that more than 60 percent of Americans believe the Federal Government is responsible for ensuring healthcare to all citizens. Everyone knows about Medicare, but everyone does not understand that Medicare is truly “socialized medicine”. Medicare is successful because there is no middle man, no profit margin and no shareholders to answer to. The administrative costs required to support a large for-profit insurance company do not exist with Medicare.

It is time for the citizens of this country to take a stand against those who would refuse them this basic human right. Ignorance and apathy created this issue, and knowledge and engagement will solve it.

UPDATE: 11/13/18 – The link attached to “Recent polls” was updated to a working link. The previous link was from the Pew Research Center.

Also published on Medium.