Obamacare

Well, it finally looks like we may actually be making some progress with this healthcare thing.  Today, in a landmark ruling, the Supreme Court upheld President Barack Obama's healthcare law.  In a 5-4 vote, the law was deemed to be constitutional, as the mandate can be looked at as a tax...blah blah blah.  But let's get down to the reality of the situation here.

We live in a country that calls itself the wealthiest, most powerful, most prosperous country in the world, and yet around 50 million of our fellow citizens don't have any health coverage.  Entire families go broke because of the illness of one child; many of the elderly must suffer a standard of living that most of us would find unbearable due to the costs of their prescription medications.  However, even those without healthcare must be treated (at the expense of the tax-payer), which not only unfairly places a burden on all who pay taxes, but also drives up the costs of healthcare to astronomical heights.  (Ever gotten a hospital bill and seen the ridiculous charges for things like cotton swabs and gauze?)   It seems a fairly simple concept to grasp that if everyone is paying for health insurance, the cost is shifted from the backs of those who do have health insurance and must cope with the rising costs of premiums (and tax hikes), to a shared pool that we all pay into.  It's really quite simple.

Now, I know that some people think that it is unfair that they have to pay money to ensure that other people are insured, but that argument is so far off-base it's not even in the stadium--and here's why.  First of all, as mentioned above, no one can be denied medical care based on the absence of insurance coverage.  I believe we all agree that that is a good thing, right?  I mean, turning someone away who is in need of medical attention requires an attitude of indifference and outright cruelty that has absolutely no place in a society like ours.  It would be unconscionable to allow such behavior.  That being said, the treatment of individuals who don't have access to health insurance is a major drain on resources, especially financial ones.  Those costs have to be made up somewhere--prices for treatments go up, hospitals have to cut services and staff, etc.  Then consider the domino effect of insurance companies having to raise the cost of premiums and copays and deductibles, not covering those with pre-existing conditions, fewer people receive the care that they need, leaving more and more people sick, draining their funds and thus making paying for more medical care nearly impossible...the cycle is obvious and obviously detrimental to our health as a nation.

But, some have said, the state of healthcare in this county is already so desperate and resources spread so thin, that providing medical care for 50 million more people would just make it worse.  We would have to spread these resources that are becoming more and more limited between more and more people.  Well, let me be the one to say that this is the voice of irrational fear and nothing more.  Medical care is not something we can run out of.  Sure, it may take some creativity and ingenuity to figure out how to continue to produce the material resources (like medications, syringes, or what have you), but healthcare is about much more than those items.  And with new developments in treatments, who's to say that we will even need those particular items in the future.  Not to mention that if more people have access to healthcare, especially preventative medicine, we can shift the paradigm away from making sick people better to keeping people healthy!  How about that for saving some resources?  If we can go into a doctor for a regular check-up, thanks to our insurance, we are several times less likely to suffer an advanced illness (that is outrageously costly to treat) that we didn't catch in time, or that may be the result of lifestyle choices that people aren't even aware they are making because no one has told them how it adversely affects their health.  The possible benefits of becoming actively involved in our own healthcare and having regular access to professionals to work with are limited only by our imaginations.

In the months to come, leading up to the election in November, there is going to be a lot of shit being spread around.  Be prepared for confusing rhetoric and hot-button appeals to emotion and passion rather than logic and the common good.  Be vigilant and pay attention to what is really being said, and keep in mind what the real purpose is behind all of this--healing the sick, taking responsibility for ourselves and our country, and love for our fellow human beings.  That's all it really comes down to after all, isn't it?