There are several reasons why someone may lack health care: the company that they work for does not offer it, they are unemployed and cannot afford health insurance, or while they may earn a good salary, it is still low enough to keep the price of insurance out of reach.
But, who cares about the reasons? What matters is that a developed nation—capable of investing in transportation of humans to space or in weapons that could destroy the planet in the blink of an eye— is incapable of helping with the health of its citizens.
Incompetence comes with a price: a study published in the American Journal of Public Health in 2009 reported that each year, 45,000 preventable deaths are caused by a lack of health insurance. Given that the number of people without health insurance increased from 46 million in 2009 to 48.6 million in 2012, it would be a safe guess that the number of preventable deaths due to a lack of health insurance has also increased to about 48,000 per year.
The lack of insurance not only kills faster, but it also costs more.
Those without health care coverage should ideally be absorbed in by good-will establishments, by those who are insured —through higher costs— or by the general public through increased taxes. On the other hand, those who are not covered utilize less services and, according to reports, are charged more for medical services than those who have Medicare, Medicaid, or private insurance.
It is a fact that a lack of health insurance either kills Americans or leaves them penniless. More than 60 percent of personal bankruptcies in this country are a result of medical costs.
And the majority of these individuals had health insurance. According to a report by The American Journal of Medicine (AJM), personal bankruptcies as a result of medical costs have increased almost 50% in the past six years, from 46% in 2001 to 62% in 2007, and most of those who filed for bankruptcy were middle-class.
As Dr. Steffie Woolhandler of the Harvard Medical School —and the lead author of the AJM report— put it: “Unless you’re a Warren Buffett or Bill Gates, you’re one illness away from financial ruin in this country.”
These are the circumstances within which Obamacare arises. Its rationale: nobody should be denied health coverage anymore, and no one should pay more for getting sick. Since all of the plans come from private insurance companies, these institutions will have to compete to obtain new clients. Despite opposition from the GOP, the legislation sounds conservative and reasonable.
Maybe it is not the best legislation out there, but it is the only significant action taken in years by politicians more worried about scoring political points with their uninformed constituency than actually producing legislation with an eye set on the future.
