Work on worry No. 1
The Des Moines Register
March 12, 2003
Editorial: Work on worry No. 1
By Register Editorial Board
Pick your biggest personal worry: losing your job, not being able to pay the mortgage, losing money in the stock market, becoming a victim of a terrorist attack.
All those concerns are beaten out by people worrying about the cost - and future - of health care, according to a recent survey conducted for the Kaiser Family Foundation.
They should worry.
* America spends more on health care than any other nation, yet this country ranks poorly on life expectancy, infant mortality and immunization rates. An expensive, hodgepodge system isn't getting the job done.
* A 2000 survey by the World Health Organization ranked the U.S. health-care system 37th overall. In the "fairness" category, this country came in 54th, right in line with Fiji.
* More than 40 million Americans are uninsured.
* Soaring health-care costs contribute to everything from teacher layoffs to bankruptcies to the federal deficits. They hurt the economy and diminish quality of life.
Americans should be concerned.
That concern should spur people to demand real change. Instead, those in Washington remain focused on patching up individual pieces of the hodgepodge system.
The latest example is Medicare. It stands to consume one-fourth of the federal budget by 2030, yet seniors expect a costly new prescription-drug benefit to be added. How should Medicare be reformed?
That's the wrong question.
The right question is: How can the U.S. health-care system be reformed in its entirety? The American people are being duped if they continue to allow politicians to narrow the larger debate about health care down to plugging only one hole in a ship that's full of holes. The debate can't focus just on Medicare, or just on Medicaid, or just on the uninsured, or just on rising costs to employers and their employees. They're all facets of the same problem.
All of America frets about health care, according to the Kaiser survey. It's time to get serious about devising a system that works for all of America. That would be one that covers everyone and slows the increase in costs.
http://www.dmregister.com/opinion/stories/c2125555/20709539.html