WHY NOT A NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SERVICE FOR EVERYBODY?

Our healthcare is a fragmented overpriced mess. Other developed countries have a rational (and normal IMO) view of how health care should work. We have a lopsided excess of specialized services and not enough focus on prevention. Those with enough money can fix it, some are eligible for Medicare/Medicaid. All others are left paying way too much, or wait till it gets so bad they go to the ER, then can't pay the bill.

 

A drop in the bucket compared to mandatory spending where all the explosive growth is happening. The CBO estimates discretionary spending by 2029 will only be 12% of the total budget.

 

Standard political partisan BS

 

This is an aspect of private health care I hadn't considered. The NHS in England struggles to fill roles in certain medical areas, but covers this by rotating doctors through them. What do you do in a system where the doctor decides what area they want to specialise in. Hmmm.

 

I wanted to get to the bottom of this 'Discretionary spend' tax. (Its not something we have in the UK.)
According to this site Mandatory spending is split 60% for Social Security and other income support programs.
Most of the remainder paid for the two major government health programs, Medicare and Medicaid.

So it seems health spending has moved from discretionary spend to mandatory spend?

https://www.taxpolicycenter.org/briefing-book/how-does-federal-government-spend-its-money#:~:text=Discretionary Spending&text=Unlike mandatory spending, both the,to about 30 percent now.

 

Can anyone in the world go on medical vacations to countries with nationalized healthcare for free healthcare - and then return home?

 

The US Constitution prohibits a national healthcare system like Britain, Portugal, Spain or Sweden (who is actually privatizing).

The federal and State governments, along with a special interest group called the American Hospital Association are solely responsible for creating the nightmare you hate so much.

No other parties are responsible for this nightmare, except the federal and State governments and the AHA and you cannot prove otherwise.

 

People travel and have certain procedures done. Are you suggesting Americans should just travel for our healthcare? lol
...or you're concerned people would flock to the U.S. if we had something similar.

 

The latter since that is what the Democratic Party promises.

 

Covid-19 mortality rate in Italy is quite high.
One of the reasons of this is just the poor level of the general public health care: it allows Italians to live a long life, but the conditions of large majority of Italian elders are not exceptional. Despite our NHS is a kind of financial black hole wasting mountains of money coming from the tax payers. And in case of necessity the sanitary system doesn't work so well.

The amusing aspect of discussions like this one is that in Italy [a country with a historical general public National Health System] we are more and more thinking to go towards a private system ... while in US there is who thinks to copy the Italian system ...

May be in the middle between the two systems there is something good. One never knows.

 

Having travelled in Italy, I would say the main reason Italy has suffered so badly is their extended family life. Every night they gather in huge extended families and eat together, their lives are very interwoven. Its lovely and warm, but a nightmare for controlling Covid.