A Single Payer Health Care System

Health care spending in the United States of America as a percentage of the economy has reached astonishing heights, equating to 17.7 percent. This number is shocking when compared to other counties; in Australia health care is 8.9 percent, in United Kingdom 9.4 percent, in Canada 11.2 percent. If the American health care system were to hypothetically become its own economy, it would be the fifth-largest in the world. While these statistics sound troubling, they lead us to look for answers about the problems surrounding our system. The first health insurance company was created in the 1930s to give all American families an equal opportunity for hospital care and eventually led to a nationwide economic and social controversy that erupted in the 1990s and continued to be shaped by the government, insurance companies, doctors, and American citizens. In this paper, I will go in to detail about the various opinions regarding the controversy, the history behind health insurance companies, and the main dilemmas brought out by the health care crisis. Greedy insurance companies combined with high costs of doctor visits and pharmaceutical drugs or the inefficient hospitals all over America can only describe the beginning to this in depth crisis. Recently, the United States health care industry has become know for the outrageous costs of insurance models, developments of various social and health services programs, and the frequent changes in medicinal technology.

The U.S. health care system faces challenges that indicate that the people urgently need to be reform. Attention has rightly focused on the approximately 46 million Americans who are uninsured, and on the many insured Americans who face rapid increases in premiums and out-of-pocket costs. As Congress and the Obama administration consider ways to invest new funds to reduce the number of Americans without insurance coverage, we must simultaneously address shortfalls in the quality and efficiency of care that lead to higher costs and to poor health outcomes. To do otherwise casts doubt on the feasibility and sustainability of coverage expansions and also ensures that our current health care system will continue to have large gaps even for those with access to insurance coverage.

While campaigning for the 2016 presidential election, Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont proposed that America should adopt a single-payer health care system. In Sanders’s plan, there would have been only one insurance program that would have covered everyone in the United States; in effect, other programs such as Medicaid, Medicare, and especially private insurance would be discontinued (Holahan, 2016, p. 1). If Sanders’s proposal were to be carried out, it would be a drastic change from the current system which predominately comprises of private insurance and hospitals under limited government regulations. The debate reopened on whether or not a single-payer system would be an effective system health care system or economically viable. Due to the contrasting nature of current health care system in the United States, policymakers should approach proposals of single-payer health care systems with caution and an understanding of the benefits and the drawbacks by examining the successes and failures of real-world systems.

I will compare the current health care system with the new Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) that became law on March 23, 2010.   The current system, which is being phased out between 2011 and 2018 is increasingly inaccessible to many poor and lower-middle-class people. About 47 million Americans lack health insurance, an increase of more than two million people from 2005 (Rover, 2011) the increasingly complex warfare between insurers and hospitals over who pays the bills is gobbling up a great deal of money and the end result is that the United States pays roughly twice as much per

Single payer reimbursement is a health care financing system that “includes both the collection of money for health care and reimbursement of providers for health care costs.” In such a system, the government or a quasi public agency is the entity that bears full responsibility of collecting funds and reimbursing appropriate parties, but the provision of care remains in private hands. Through taxpayer funds, the government collects money from individuals and businesses, and then reimburses providers who delivered health care services to those individuals enrolled in the public health insurance program. (http://www.pnhp.org/facts/what-is-single-payer).

The title of the book being reviewed is Critical Condition: How Health Care in America Became Big Business and Bad Medicine written by Donald Barlett and James Steele in 2004. This title explains what will be described in the book; how health care was transformed into more of a business and reduced the quality of care to the communities served. The main audience was to Americans in general. The purpose of this book was to show Americans the flawed health care system and explain how it grew out of control. The quality has decreased significantly, access to care has been restricted by the insurance moguls and lack of paying providers. Lastly, the cost of going to see a provider for any treatment has skyrocketed while the economy was unstable. The argument was that changing United States health care to a single-payer system will benefit Americans with better, more quality care and also reduce cost overall by eliminating private insurers.

One solution I found very remarkable is the single payer healthcare system created by Senator Bernie Sanders. The objective for this solution is for middle class and up to pay a bit more in taxes than the poor. The benefits of this program will provide more medical attention to the public without co-payments, deductibles and premiums. This will allow people to pick the hospital of their choice without the hassle from an insurance company.

As a country we are facing currently facing a problem based on health care. Every country has their own way of doing things, but which way makes the most sense? Statistics show that Canada’s health care system is working for them, but will it work for the United States? Ezekial J. Emanuel, Holly Dressel, and together, Karen Davis, Cathy Shoen, Katharine Shea, and Kristine Haran, all address possible solutions to this problem. While Emanuel feels that America’s system is sufficient, Dressel, Davis, Shoen, Shea, and Haran believe there are better options. These authors evaluate the different systems based on quality, cost, and accessibility.

Health insurance in this country can trace its early origins back to 1847, when the plans were offered that provided disability compensation to participants, then, beginning in the 1930’s, insurance became more focused on financing the costs due to illness (U.S. National Library of Medicine, 2016). Unlike countries that have a single national program to fund medical services for their citizens, the United States currently relies on a multi-payer system to finance health care (Gusamano & Rodwin, n.d., p.55). Utilizing this multi-payer system certainly has implications within many areas of this nation’s health care delivery and its favorable impact over a single payer system for three of these; quality of care, timely access to treatment, and

Instead of using net income to increase salaries, it would be used for increasing health services (Relman 35). Development programs and modernization would be financed by independent grants going towards the needs of communities instead of profit (Gaffney 988). Performance costs would not be used for profits, advertisements, or business investments (Gaffney 988). In comparison, a single payer healthcare system would give complete health coverage leaving out deductibles and copayments to every American (Gaffney 987).

Healthcare performance is strongly dependent on the economy, and on the health systems themselves. There are many debates on the type of health care system. Insurance companies are the crucial investor that is not only demanded but also an essential priority for most societies due to some of the complex challenges in the health system, in part derived from new pressures, such as ageing populations, growing prevalence of chronic illnesses, and intensive use of expensive yet vital health technologies (Frenk, J. 2004). Government has a diverse role in the health care system. However, based on the need and preference of majorities of American societies, a system with single government control in U.S, might not be effective and qualitative in long run. The present multi payer system is more effective in health care delivery. The reform in the overall management system of government organization focusing its role on supervising and controlling the health services’ system than distributing one is necessary.

Health care cost and quality is a major topic of conversation in the United States (U.S.). With the cost of health care spiraling out of control, the U.S. is spending an average of $9,086 per person per year on health care (Mahon, 2015)Click and drag to move. Although, the U.S. spending on health care is higher than the other high-income nations across the world, the U.S. has the lowest life expectancy (Mahon, 2015). In the U.S., health care cost and quality are impacted by both public and private agencies. Public agencies are organizations that have an impact on the entire country; while private agencies make an impact on certain communities or states. In this paper, we are going to take a closer look at the roles of these agencies in how

While America has more doctors per one-thousand people the doctor office waits would be dreadful, it would be similar to waiting at the Department of Motor Vehicles. Under a single-payer health care system, patients would have to wait to schedule an appointment then wait for an additional time to see the doctor, much like the Department of Motor Vehicles. Michael Tanner and Cannon both strengthen this analogy by stating that “the wait for heart surgery can be as long as 25 weeks” in Sweden and “some will probably die awaiting treatment” (Cannon and Tanner). They also wrote that nearly nine-hundred thousand British citizens were awaiting treatment at a National Health Service hospital and over fifty-thousand surgeries were canceled, most likely due to lack of resources (Tanner and

Health care costs in America have reached an all-time high of 16% of gross domestic product, making the U.S. the single biggest spender on health care in the world. As health care in America is assessed and analyzed there is continued debate on the inefficiencies, and fragmentation, and high costs in medications, program administration, and medical innovation. This has led to discussion, theories, and studies of single-payer health coverage, and how the U.S could adapt a single-payer system. While no one has purposed a concrete system, theories exist that a single-payer system can create savings in total health care cost. In this paper two articles are reviewed that speak to

US health care expenditures have been rising quickly over the past few years; it has risen more than the national financial system. Nonetheless a number of citizens in the US still lack appropriate health care. If the truth be told, health care expenditures are going to continue to increase; in addition numerous individuals will possibly have to make difficult choices pertaining to their health care. Our health system has grave problems that require reform, through reforming, there is optimism that there will be an increase in affordable health care and high-quality of care for America. Medicaid, Medicare and private sector insurances are all going through trials and tribulations because of