The truth is that the perfect healthcare system does not exist — each country reflects its own social priorities. There is no right answer, especially as healthcare budgets continue to rise across the developed world. In the United States, universal coverage is sacrificed in favor of individual choice and control. Voters are worried that a government run system may deny them their choice of doctor or drug, or even see granny up before a "death panel." In the U.K., while universal access is a core principle, survival rates from serious diseases lag behind those of other developed countries and choice for patients is extraordinarily limited.
Health care can never be affordable, high quality and universal. Politicians consistently claim that it can tick all of the boxes, whereas the reality is that high quality systems are either unaffordable, or not available to everyone. Yet politicians from every country continue to pretend that the unobtainable goal of affordable, universal, high-quality care is just around the corner.
Debates about public or private models of funding are actually something of a sideshow, for two reasons. First there is a false dichotomy between privately and publicly funded systems. Almost all healthcare costs are shared, whether through redistributive taxation or pooled risk in an insurance fund.
The second reason is that populations are ageing, so that more retired people rely on relatively fewer workers to fund their care. All across the world, countries are struggling to meet the costs of health care, with spending predicted to continue rising in the decades ahead. It is simply untrue to suggest that this problem can be tackled through tinkering with funding models: health care needs to be paid for somehow.
The worst scenario for the future is that the poor and sick are hit hardest. As health care budgets increase, more and more attention will be paid to the chronic diseases that result from unhealthy lifestyles. No longer do healthcare systems deal with polio, smallpox and other infectious diseases. The big killers today are obesity, diabetes and cancer — problems related to alcohol, smoking, poor nutrition and lack of exercise. Whether privately or publicly run, health systems will begin to put enormous pressure on people with unhealthy lives to shape up or risk losing coverage.
President Obama’s challenge, therefore, is even greater than reforming the health system. Politicians everywhere must begin to find ways to inspire or compel voters to get healthier if health care systems across the developed world are not to collapse into bankruptcy. Personal example is a good place to start.
In the very long run it weakens the genetic pool .
Ref: (survival of the fittest)
In the short term it destroys the dollar because the US Gov , in their infinite wisdom prints money to pay for programs they can.t afford.
November 26th, 2009 at 4:19 pm
In the very long run it weakens the genetic pool .
Ref: (survival of the fittest)
In the short term it destroys the dollar because the US Gov , in their infinite wisdom prints money to pay for programs they can.t afford.
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