Analysis Of The Movie ' Sicko ' By Michael Moore

The lucrative healthcare companies in America have created an immeasurable gap between good healthcare only being for the privileged upper class Americans which has left a horrible effect on the middle and lower class Americans. As modern medicine achieves new heights, the prices of healthcare seem to tread right behind maintaining an unbroken pattern that American classes have grown accustomed to over the past few decades of paying more for less. Leaving many Americans uninsured, underinsured, or even in debt. In a speech Bernie Sanders a U.S. Senator from Vermont spoke at a presidential campaign October of 2015 which he discussed the unruly problematic healthcare trend of price gouging, that is the medical industry getting the most it can from American citizens. In a blog Bernie Sanders states that “46 million Americans today have no health insurance and even more are underinsured with high deductibles and co-payments” (Sanders). 18,000 Americans die every year from preventable illnesses because they cannot cover the cost and don’t go to the doctor when they should. Sanders summed this situation up with this “Health Care is a Right, Not a Privilege” (Sanders). After researching the issue of healthcare, I have come to the conclusion that the American healthcare system is disintegrating due to the ravenousness of modern medical industries, first I will discuss a few reasons to why the healthcare system is failing the modern American

Michael Moore depicts the American health care system as one that contains many flaws. He goes on to show different people who have not been able to afford the ridiculous sum of money to perform certain procedures. While scrutinizing the American health care system Michael ventures to Canada, France, Cuba and Great Britain in an attempt to compare health insurance and pharmaceuticals.

Many forces shape our current healthcare system. Our cultural belief and values shape our views on our social, political, and economic exigencies. While our beliefs and values usually represent basic or core impressions of individuals in our society, they are constantly changing. Thus, they lend a sense of dynamism to our health care system. Our cultural beliefs and values also impact our sense of ethics, which also influences how we allocate our health resources and our sense of social justice, or lack of it. And although ACA represents a major reform the American health care system, history will tell us whether it survives after the next election cycles. Many of the forces in American health care that affected its evolution in the past are present today.

“Sicko” is a documentary produced by Michael Moore that focuses on health care in America.The documentary provides an in depth understanding and analysis of the unceasing health care problems in America. Most of these problems result from the corruption present in the American health insurance industry. The message that Michael Moore is trying to get across to his audience is that of the immortality within the American health care system. Michael Moore is able to get his message across to the public by incorporating the three rhetoric techniques of logos, pathos, and ethos. He uses logos by comparing America’s health insurance to those of other countries,

In our nation, we have an abundance of everything from economic prosperity to defense. Nevertheless, being ahead compared to other nations in the world in almost all of the categories, we are still far behind in all of our citizens covered under medical insurance program. President Obama had a good start to somewhat of a so-so policy the Affordable Health Care. The Congress fell short in implementing the public option. There have been more than several failed attempts to repeal Obamacare, and the current Congress is on a new version of that. The ethical dilemma is that insurance companies that cover their customers survive on profits by limiting coverage of illnesses or by not covering pre-existing conditions.

Can our healthcare system be regarded results-based and rational? Dr. Otis Brawley does not think so. Neither do I. In his thought provoking book, How we Do Harm: A Doctor Breaks Ranks about Being Sick in America, Brawley paints a picture of a system that is riddled with both inequalities and inconsistencies. There are times I have wondered whether our health care is indeed the best in the world. I have had my doubts. After reading Brawley's book, I became convinced that there is an urgent need to ensure that our health care system is not only affordable but also rational.

Block, W. (2008). Is there a human right to medical insurance?. Business & Professional Ethics Journal, 27(1/4), 1-33. Retrieved from http://secure.pdcnet.org.ezproxy.liberty.edu:2048/pdc/bvdb.nsf/toc?openform&journal=pdc_bpej&yearrange=1999 –2009&category=0027_40182_2008

Sicko, a documentary film by Michael Moore, describes the medical issue in which many people who live in the United States have to suffer their sickness due to the high treatment costs. Many people in the U.S. do not have health insurance because they can afford for that. However, not only people that do not have health insurance but also the people who have health insurance struggle for health care coverage when they have an illness. Moreover, compared to other countries such as Canada, England, France and Cuba, American health care system is extreme complicated and extremely expensive. To receive the treatment, patients in the United States have to go through multiple questions and processes, but there is no assurance that they will have the most effective treatment.

The film Sicko presented key fundamental aspects that were almost absolutely unfamiliar. To begin with, the documentary contrasted by convictions that Medicare could be obtained free of charge as a universal basic right. The depiction of the interviews that the film maker, Moore conducted to the Canadian, French and Cuban citizens proved that patients in those states obtained free, unbiased Medicare, unlike in the United States. In this regard, the film was an eye opener that there are individuals who are undertaking free and universal Medicare while obtaining similar services within the United States is a nightmare (Moore, 2011). In addition, the documentary presents surprising bias that is expended to the American citizens. According to Ebert,

Imagine a nation where one did not have to worry about deductibles, high monthly insurance rates, and being denied health care. Is this possible? Can the United States (U.S.) have this or is such a nation fiction? Michael Moore, known documentary filmmaker, set out on a mission. This mission was featured in his documentary, Sicko. The mission consisted of multiple rhetorical strategies to disclose the positive and negative effects of socialized health care. The great thing about this topic is that it’s applicable to a wide audience. From teenagers just starting to get health insurance, to people midway through their life that may have been burned by the industry, to seniors that need to still work in their eighties to pay off their health care bills. Moore gives good insight to both sides of the argument, and allows the audience to examine all factors. Through many accounts of Moore’s credibility, emotional connections, and pure facts; the audience is strongly convinced that the U.S. should move to a socialized health care system.

In, filmmaker, Michael Moore’s “Sicko” basic struggles between people and health insurances are pointed out. There is a centralized focus on how difficult insurances make the acceptability of their coverage. The slightest past history that the insurance deems within their ineligibility criteria, makes a person, in need of health coverage, suffer under thousand of dollars procedures. There was a patient in the documentary who needed two of his digits reattached but was given a choice of one which costed approximately $40,000 or the other which was only $12,000. Some people have even resorted to doing their own sutures in their unclean, unsterile homes. A patient was also denied care for a treatment for cancer because the hospital, that the patient’s

The Michael Moore movie pointed to a myriad of issues relating to the American healthcare system that are both startling and interesting. The movie was produced before the Obama Administration signed the Affordable Care Act into law, but Sicko reports that nearly 50 million Americans do not have health insurance. About 18,000 Americans die each year because they don't have health insurance. The system is clearly broken, and politics seems to have been the reason that insurance companies keep a strangle hold on consumers. For example, Sicko reports that there are nearly four times as many lobbyists in Washington D.C. pushing for their clients' agenda as there are members of Congress.

The purpose of this letter is to bring attention to a current issue regarding medical malpractice companies. I strongly believe something should be done to limit the amount of profit received from these private insurers. In “How The Industry Used Tort Reform to Increase Profits While Americans’ Premiums soared”, by the American Association for Justice (AAJ), explains that even though some would think caps will lower the annual premiums for physicians and patients it is, in fact, increasing the company’s profit. The AAJ reports that “in states with caps” these medical malpractice companies and insurance agencies have higher profits of “24 percent”.

Health care costs are high for multiple reasons. Inefficiency is happening because doctors lack resources that inform them about their patients’ past tests and prescriptions. This costs time and money. According to Furchtgott-Roth (2009), former chief economist at the U.S. Department of Labor, ten cents of every dollar paid to the doctor goes to his or her malpractice insurance. These rates are so high because there is no cap on the amount of money a doctor can be sued. Doctors even fear being sued for doing “too little” in the patients’ eyes. Because of this, doctors end up running unnecessary tests and prescribing unneeded drugs. Medical News Today acerbates that health care is so expensive because we spend $147 billion per year on problems that

Sicko is a documentary about the American Health Care system as seen through the eyes of the filmmaker Michael Moore. It presents the health care system in America as being fragmented and inefficient by using anecdotes to illustrate the plight of the 46 million Americans without health insurance and also to address the wider concerns about the kind of care that the insured get. The film also compares the non-universal and for-profit U.S. system with publicly funded health systems of Canada, the United Kingdom, France and Cuba.