National Healthcare

We now find ourselves in a national debate on improving health care for Americans. The rhetoric is flying, and so far little common sense has entered the debate. I have a few thoughts.

• Health care is not a right. I cringe every time I hear a person say that we have a right to health care. Rights are described in the Declaration of Independence, U.S. Constitution and associated amendments. No where in those documents will you find a right to health care. It would take a Supreme Court ruling to find that right. It may happen, but if it does we will have a good example of judicial activism.
• The United States Health care system is not broken. We have the best health care in the world. As with most things, you get what you pay for and ours is expensive. Our Canadian neighbors to the north have national health care. Why do those who can afford it come to the United States for health care? One answer, the care is better here than it is there.
• Medicare/Medicaid is not a model we can replicate. Many proponents of national health care claim that the government is ready to run the system. All that is needed is an expansion of medicare. It won't work and would likely cripple the U.S. health care system. The reason is that medicare is part of the problem. The rates paid by medicare are so low that many providers must inflate what they charge to private insurance plans to make up the difference. Expanding medicare would make the health care business unprofitable.
• Reward good behavior. Bad behavior such as smoking and obesity are the root of 80% of health care claims. The cost of health care would decline remarkably if office visits, surgeries, and hospital stays declined by a portion of the 80% of costs related to non-healthy behavior. Good behaviour should be rewarded with lower insurance rates. This is already occurring in some plans and by a few self-insured companies, and will work if implemented uniformly.
• Government is not the answer to lower cost. The government cannot be part of a competitive mix of health care plans. The reason is that a national health care plan would have the backing of the American taxpayer and the money printing power of the U.S. Treasury. A private insurance firm cannot be expected to compete with a government plan that may lose money, (as medicare does today), and simply pass the loss onto future generations in the form of debt.
• Competition by health care providers is required. If the average health care consuming citizen was required to pay for a larger percentage of their health care, you would begin to see consumers shop for the best deal. This would incent providers to become a lower cost option than their competitors. You would see hospitals, general care, and specialist providers retool their offerings so they could garner the most business. This model would dilute the cost of special equipment or services across many paying customers. Cost could be expected to decrease while quality could improve.

Those of us who believe that President Obama is moving to establish government control of the U.S economy know that common sense will never enter the debate. This is about growing government control. Health care is the next item to nationalize after banks, mortgage lendering, car and insurance companies. It is critical to the Obama plan.