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Imagine a high school student, sitting in front of the class room, close to the white board, but he can barely see the teacher’s writing because he needs glasses and his parents can’t afford them. Imagine another student who has to use a broken pair glasses throughout the academic year, because her parents can’t afford to buy a new pair. Imagine your loved one being very sick, but the hospital wants him to leave or start paying out of pocket, because his insurance won’t pay anymore. Now, imagine you just lost your job and you and your entire family no longer had health insurance. These are situations that I have encountered personally and I know that thousands or perhaps millions of Americans have had similar experiences as well.
The United States, the richest and most powerful country in human history, doesn’t have universal health care for its citizens. This country is the only advanced economy that doesn’t cover everyone. Close to 47 million people do not have health insurance. Millions of others can loose it if they lose their jobs, because for most, health insurance is employer-sponsored. Many have gone bankrupt due to high health expenses and many others have trouble getting good coverage due to pre-existing conditions. This country spends so much more than other countries on health care, but we get so much less for it. Our infant mortality is the highest among all industrialized countries; in some US cities the infant mortality rate is even higher than countries such as Cuba. Our life expectancy is lower than other countries and we have more obese children than other countries. Sadly, the overall health of this society is worse than other advanced economies.
Health insurance is a multi billion dollar business in the US. Health insurance companies are in this field to make profits and quality of care is only secondary for them. If it is not profitable, the care will not be offered. Since prevention is less profitable than treatment, the emphasis is rarely on the former and always on the latter. This system is quite wasteful as well. For every dollar that is spent on health care, about 30 cents goes for administrative costs and executive pay and bonuses. The insurance companies, through their lobbyists in C ongress and the White House, have been able to defeat almost every effort to make this system more humane and fair.
The first effort for universal coverage started in the first two decades of the 20th century. But pro-business forces defeated that effort, calling it Bolshevism and Communism (sounds familiar!!!). Then, during the Great Depression of the 1930s and right after World War II there were other attempts to get universal health care, but they were also defeated. The likes of Ronald Reagan played an important role in defeating these efforts; making propaganda radio ads frightening people of the “dangers of socialized medicine”. In the 1960’ s, under public pressure, congress was able to pass and President Johnson signed into law Medicare and Medicaid legislation, and although this law only covered seniors, it was a step forward. In the 1990’ s the push for health care reform legislation was again defeated. Who can forget the infamous Harry and Louise commercials?
Today, there is another effort in Congress and by the president to reform the health care system. Although Obama’s “Public Option” doesn’t even come close to universal coverage and he still wants to solve the health care crisis using market forces (The recent global economic crisis has shown that markets rarely solve social problems.), there is still a tremendous amount of attack on his plan by the right. The shock troops of the Right, grotesquely lead by figures such as Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity , and Glenn Beck, brand Obama’s policies as socialist and by using red bating try to scare the general population and force the Democrats (a majority of whom are quite easily frightened and frequently retreat from their positions) in Congress to back down. They claim that this health care legislation will bring about socialized medicine, big government, huge spending, health care rationing, long waits for treatments, and death panels. What they intentionally omit from their relentless, poisonous and hateful discourse is that Obama’s proposal is far from so- called socialized medicine and universal coverage which most advanced economies have. Actually, Obama is trying to save the capitalist system by reforming it (just like Franklin Roosevelt did in the 1930’s) rather than introducing socialism. As to the claim that this reform is bringing about big government and huge spending, one must respond that government has always been big and has always spent lots of money. How is it that when government spends hundreds of billions of dollars on war, the conservatives do not object? But the moment the government is forced to spend a little more on social needs, their cries reach heaven: that this can not be. Right now we do have health care rationing in this country. The rich and the powerful can get any treatment at any time they need. The rest of the population has to jump over many obstacles to get decent health care. The extreme right and the conservative Democrats, the so-called Blue Dogs, in Congress want to keep the health care system privatized and within the market system. They can not even tolerate the “Public Option”, although according to the president himself, it will only cover about 5% of the population. These conservative forces would privatize Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security if they had the power to do so.
More than 70% of the US public wants to have universal health coverage and they are willing to try different methods to reach this goal. This Public Option proposal is only a small and insufficient step in that direction. The pressure must be kept on the White House and the Congress so that they don’t back down from the goal of universal coverage. Obama’s Army, those millions of mostly young people who helped him get elected, must be active again in this grand political and social battle. They must be vigilante and fight against the propaganda by the right and also put Obama’s feet to the fire so he won’t back down from his promises to the people. Ultimately, universal health care through a single payer system must be established in order for everyone to be covered. This system would benefit the large majority of the public. The employers would no longer be able to use health benefits as an excuse or trade off for keeping wages low. Health benefits would be out of the employee - employer negotiating equation, because they would be covered by the single payer system. Imagine what GM workers could have negotiated with the company if their health benefits were not an issue. Surely, universal health coverage has its shortcomings, but it is a far better system than the employer sponsored private insurance system that we have in this country today. Just look at the way people live in Japan, Canada, and many European countries. They lead longer, and healthier lives and they don’t have to worry about losing their health coverage if they lose their jobs or when they reach their golden years. In these countries and many others, people have come to recognize that health care, just like education, is a right and not a privilege. This recognition must come about in this country as soon as possible and it can only happen by organizing and putting pressure on the powers that be.
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