Re: Can someone explain the health care \'crisis\' to me?
Nature of the crisis:
Cost of health care per capita is unreasonably high.
Patients, in the main, are not the real consumers -- their employers, and the insurance firms that serve them, are.
Public health, preventative medicine and community-based general practice are in decline as boutique specialists and high-end diagnostic and surgical procedures increase.
Pharmaceutical research is wholly profit-driven.
The health-care professional culture is increasingly entrepreneurial, rather than motivated by public service.
Solutions:
A two-tier, public/private system (with emphasis on the public part). Universal health care does not have to mean nothing but comprehensive "socialized" medicine.
A general acceptance at every level of government that basic health care is a fundamental right of all persons in the United States, including guests, and particularly the very young and the very old. More emphasis on public health information and cultural pressure to accept increased personal responsibility for one's health.
A re-dedication to health care screening for elementary school children, less emphasis on "parents' rights" on this issue, more emphasis on fundamental dental care and nutrition.
A move away from mandatory (emphasis here) direct, employer-based health-care benefits.
Stricter regulation of health-care insurance providers.
A shift back to community-based, first-echelon, first-stop medicine. All medical professionals must spent some early career time here. All medical education should be funded, in part, by the government, establishing a natural public/private partnership.
Government support for "orphan" drug research and a change in the basic model of the pharmaceutical sector to bring it more in line with public health demands.
If the society should ever opt for a two-year period of national service for all young men and women (as I have long believed it should), the entry phase should focus profoundly on individual health issues -- identify deficiencies early and fix 'em pronto. This is another opportunity for fresh medical/dental graduates.
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