cybersteward.net

Anyone who turns on a news program these days has probably heard about the furor over health care reform. And if you only pay attention to the headlines, you might actually believe some of the talk about “death panels,” “rationing” or “socialized healthcare” slurs that have been circulating, especially from people who oppose health care reform.

But if you pay a little closer attention, you probably know better.

But just in case you don’t think reform is needed, maybe you should consider that the per capita cost of health care in the U.S. is about double what it is in other industrialized countries. Or perhaps you should know that 7 out of 10 people who declare bankruptcy due to medical bills already have health insurance. Or maybe (if you need more motivation to support health care reform) I should tell you that the U.S. also lags behind other industrialized nations in terms of life expectancy.

All of these factors affect us, whether we realize it or not. And the rapidly rising cost of health insurance premiums will even affect those of us with good union-negotiated health care benefits — if we don’t do something to stem the tide.

Health care benefits are a huge part of every contract negotiated with companies like UPS, and the more expensive those benefits get, the more desperately management will try to do away with them. The rising cost of health coverage in the U.S. is also a huge part the competitive disadvantage hurting many U.S. companies whose overseas competitors benefit from more cohesive, government-structured health care.

All these facts aside, there are still people buying the propaganda that our health care (health insurance) system is the best in the world. And it probably should be, considering our system is twice as expensive. But the sad fact is most of the extra costs we face end up padding the profit margins of the insurance industry, not improving the quality of our health care.

Something needs to be done to curb the out-of-control health care costs in this country, but too many people are still stuck in the mud of lies from the past:

• Lies that suggest health care reform includes “death panels” to decide who lives and who dies — even though no such plan exists. The provision being distorted in this lie is one that provides optional counseling for those wishing to make advanced directives.
• Lies that suggest a government run program would be second-rate and include “rationing” — even though the best-ranked health care systems in the U.S. are the Veterans Administration and Medicare (which are run by the government) and neither engages in rationing anywhere near as much as the health insurance companies that deny life-saving coverage because of technicalities like “pre-existing conditions.”
• Lies that suggest we don’t need reform because there aren’t really 45 million uninsured in this country — even though the problems with our system affect the insured almost as badly as the uninsured.

The White House has put up a site to debunk some of the myths and misunderstandings, which you can access by clicking the image at the top of this post, or by clicking here.

It’s important to educate ourselves on this vital issue, and then to make our voices heard. I encourage you to do both, before it’s too late.

Filed under: editorial, politics, poverty and wealth, rights