Universal Health Care, Anyone?

One of the major concerns for anyone heading to a foreign country is 'how will my medical needs be addressed?' Well everyone, I get to enjoy universal health care in what is considered the longest-running government-sponsored health care system in the world. I will pay for nothing outside of prescriptions at a very reasonable £7.10 (about $12.37)-- much less than what most of us pay for any prescription here, and minor fees associated with dentists and opticians. All medical visits from hospital stays to consultations with a General Practitioner are completely covered. So as people here in the states are either itching for Barack's step toward universal coverage or McCain's 'every man for himself' coverage, I get to experience what we could have.

The real question one must ask when comparing McCain's proposed system to Obama's is whether or not the individual bear most of the financial blow or of it is the government's turn to cover more people. The Obama plan, asserting that it will save the average American family (how many times have we heard that phrase over the last few weeks-- I'm sure that won't stop any time soon) $2,500 by eliminating those famous George Bush tax cuts for those earning $250,000 and up and feeding it into the system, in addition to transferring the highest-cost claims from the individual to the federal government. McCain and his 'rugged individualist' approach to health care argues that too much is already spent on health care, so the best way to tackle it is to redistribute tax benefits to individuals who most need them in order to provide the necessary incentives to improve the state of the system. Essentially, the McCain plan argues that instead of the government paying up front to make health care more affordable, market reforms must be implemented in order to make care more affordable for the individual consumer.

What is interesting about the Obama plan (quite similar to Hillary Clintons plan) is that it recognizes that many people will want to keep their pre-existing private coverage-- and that is OK. It is simply a bastardization of the systems that exist throughout Europe where people select from government programs, and the general idea of universal health care. But I suppose that makes sense as the American version of universal health care. For some reason we just enjoy being different.

I leave on this figure, courtesy of the most reputable source of information on The Interweb, Wikipedia: only 8% of people in England use private health care (so 92% use public health care), and the programs are basically just add-ons to the existing public health system; only 27.8% of the American population has their health care covered by the government.