I would proposed a deregulated atmosphere in which medical providers would be forced to compete for families’ health care money, yielding cheaper and much-improved health care. The problem with our system, in part, is all the incentives to buy health insurance. When everything is ensured, the medical providers, always able to bill the deep pockets of insurance companies, have no incentive to provide superior health care at lower prices. The poor, who cannot afford health insurance, end up losing big-time. The predatory lawsuit industry and the current socialized areas of medicine (Medicare, Medicaid, S-CHIP) do not help any, either.
IIRC, health insurance in the country used to be simply for such things as major operations, similar to auto insurance covering only accidents and acts of god. Routine health care and minor incidents, similar to regular maintenance on an automobile, were paid for out of pocket.
Look at it this way: if you buy a box of band-aids in a store, you might pay a couple bucks or so. If you require a band-aid while staying at the hospital, you might pay much more for the one band-aid, when the factors of health insurance deep pockets, medical malpractice costs, default on medical bills by the uninsured, nurses union salaries, and whatever else are taken into account.
I don’t want children going without health care (and as far as I know, they usually don’t, either, since medical bills can be paid in installments). I suspect that such horrors as that poor kid who died from a tooth infection are a rarity. Health INSURANCE, on the other hand, can be quite expensive once you factor in all the Federal and State mandates that make it impossible to lower prices. Not to mention, there is a prohibition on purchasing insurance across state lines, so instead of having a national health insurance market, you have 50 statewide markets, lessening competition. Once again, the poor lose out.
These liberals who impose all these mandates and restrictions should take a long look in the mirror before accusing us of wanting to deny health care to children and young adults.
My husband was on Medicaid after a horrible accident. He had just recently changed jobs and didn’t have health insurance yet. His med pay from his insurance company was $1000. His medical bills were nearly $300,000. There was no way we could pay that. He got excellent medical care from some of the best doctors in town. He still goes through the local health department for follow-up care. Medicaid was so easy. I never really knew anything about it before his accident.
As for health care providers accepting payments, none that I know of will. That is why so many people end up using the ER for everything. I think more low-cost clinics would help. And as for nurses salaries, they deserve every penny they make.
When I was growing up, most parents could afford regular doctor visits for their children. These days a check-up can cost half a week’s salary. Health insurance is very expensive and lots of working people just can’t afford it.
I’m not sure what the answer is, but with our congressman seemingly willing to give away $900 billion dollars, I don’t begrude children getting health care. Better to spend money on them than Wall Street executives and abortions in foreign countries, IMHO.