You won't find any passive opinions on this subject. People are very passionate about their stand on whether we should leave the system the way it is and refine it or go to a national healthcare system. All can agree on one thing-- it's a broken system.
National healthcare sounds great from many perspectives. It's free right? Hah! No, it's not free. Nothing is free. There is a huge price that has to be paid.
One might expect someone like myself who doesn't have any health insurance to be all for national healthcare. That person would be wrong. While I hate the money hungry, self preserving Insurance companies and the doctors who abuse the system and drive up premiums, I know that we will be worse off to be on the other side of the coin.
I don't write this to solve the present crisis because if I could I would be a rich man and wouldn't have time to write this. I can however give several reasons and references as to why national healthcare is NOT the solution. Perhaps I will just stick with references to prove my point. Hang on, here we go.
1. Where does the money for "Free Healthcare" come from?
The short answer. YOUR pocket.
"The most obvious component of "free" healthcare is that, in fact, it is not free. Socialized medicine is paid for through taxation, and in countries in which it is practiced, everyone pays these taxes. Much like our own "Social Security" tax, which imposes a 15.2% tax on anyone who works for a living, socialized medicine schemes are paid for through a combination of income taxes and national sales taxes, or VAT taxes. In other words, working people pay for "free" healthcare through payroll taxes and taxes on purchases. Nonworking people and individuals working for cash still pay for "free" healthcare every time they buy gasoline, food or clothing." Read more here.
2. What happens if the government runs out of money and can't pay for your doctor visit?
Think it can't happen? It's happening right now. In California. "Top financial officers say (July 28th) that's when the state will run out of cash to pay its daily expenses unless lawmakers pass a balanced budget. Schwarzenegger has warned that government will come to a "grinding halt." The state controller describes "a meltdown." Read the whole article here.
3. How well do you think you are going to get treated?
The answer: Like a number. There will be little to no personal concern for your situation. While that may be somewhat of a problem with the current system, it will become the norm under socialized medicine. Ever been to the DMV and stood in line? That's how social medicine works.
Consider this quote. "Many countries provide universal insurance but deny critical procedures to patients who need them. Britain's Department of Health reported in 2006 that at any given time, nearly 900,000 Britons are waiting for admission to National Health Service hospitals, and shortages force the cancellation of more than 50,000 operations each year. In Sweden, the wait for heart surgery can be as long as 25 weeks, and the average wait for hip replacement surgery is more than a year." Read the whole article.4. Will you have choices in ways you can be treated?
No. In fact a treatment you need may not be provided resulting in your death. Want proof? Read this article to get more on this quote. "If I lived in New Zealand, I’d be dead."
5. Why should I have to pay for your doctor visits?
Defenders of socialized medicine have no problems stating that "universal health care transfers greater financial responsibility to an even broader base: the entire population, through some combination of taxes and premiums."(Jonathan Cohn, senior editor at The New Republic)
Um, folks that's communism. Enough said on that.
There are a host of other reasons and resources that show socialized medicine is not the answer. Do your own research, I've just provided a starting point. I get tired of people who look at solutions and embrace ideas based solely on their own perspective. A perspective that says, 'I don't have any money for health insurance so the government should take care of me by providing free healthcare'. That reasoning is selfish and ignorant. Please step outside yourself and look at how "solutions" effect everyone, not just yourself. Sadly the only way we will probably learn that socialized medicine will not work won't come from failures by other countries that we have already seen, oh no, we have to make our own disaster before we will learn.
H. L. Mencken said: "For every problem, there is a solution that is simple, elegant, and wrong." Universal healthcare is a exactly that.
I would like to give a very short biblical perspective on this if I may. Healthcare as we know it has only been around for a short time. In the history of mankind you depended on your own remedies and most of all God to be your physician. Praise the Lord that we have the healthcare that we do, but I believe it has become another way we have said to God, "We got this under control. Thanks anyways." We have somehow come to the conclusion that healthcare is a right. No, it's a privilege. Communism says everybody has the same right to all things. This country was built on the opposite of that. It is called Capitalism. You earn what you have. That leaves some people behind and I might be one of them. The reality is some succeed others don't. That is life.
