Check out this post on Matthew Yglesias' blog
I think it's precisely the health habits and lifestyles of Americans that keep the estimated price tag on a national health program so high. While I think that a comprehensive program is indeed something the government should provide, there are many American health habits that will turn even a great attempt at a glutted, faulty and unjust system.
These are outliers (to some degree), but why should a healthy American pay for the costs associated with his neighbors 20 year smoking habit or his other neighbors chronic heart problems directly developed from obesity. For years I always heard this argument as the main reason why a national health program is 'unjust', but considering the fattier foods that average Joe America eats, the hours he does not spend at the gym and myriad other harmful things he does to his body, whatever plan arises will certainly have to draw the line in some places.
3 comments:
I realize that they are definitely hyperbolized to prove the opposition for a national health care system, but the moral hazard issue presented with encompassing health insurance to unhealthy behavior is certainly a significant factor as well. Why should I quit smoking when I am guaranteed insurance? The economic incentive to change one's health habit is gone.
By no means am I advocating a status quo in the current state of health insurance because of such problems. They are indeed outliers and only fractions of cost but they are the issues that are picked in the debate over the economic equity of such a system. What really needs an overhaul is the healthcare system itself, not just insurance coverage, in order to make a well-trimmed efficient health delivering machine.
The real message is properly emphasizing the significance of healthy choices to patients. Patients can be told to stop smoking so many times until they get cancer and expect treatments to save them.
In some countries, they require patients to quit smoking for several months prior to prescribing chemotherapy. I mean, why give a person treatment if they're just going to repeat the cycle?
In essence, I don't think that the system should emphasize the "delivery of health" so much as it should supplement healthy living.
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