Persuasive Essay: Should We Have Universal Health Care?

Before the Affordable Care Act was put into work, over 45 million Americans were uninsured. The Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, was then made to help those who were uninsured. It allowed people with financial struggles with the same opportunity as everyone else to have a healthcare plan. Even though the law was passed in 2010, it took a full year of back and forth to get it passed in the Senate. Obamacare may help you get coverage, but charge you an annual fee if you don’t have one. The affordable care act should stay in effect because even though it may cost more, it regulates private insurance to get more rights and protection for each person.

Universal healthcare is not good for America. In America, universal healthcare would undermine principles important to the functioning of society; specifically, it would undermine individual liberty, free enterprise and free

I believe as a society we have moral obligation to provide healthcare to all the citizens of our nation. How would that become possible is the question? No matter what we choose as the solution to this problem, there will always be pros and cons. I think the answer is socialized medicine. Can a country like the US have socialized medicine? Yes we can, we are of a few who don’t. The cost of healthcare has been driven up so high that no one can afford it. My employers in Illinois is now insuring only the employee under the benefit plan and the spouse must use their employer, this can equate to much higher cost and employee dissatisfaction. I also see many people who bought plans from the marketplace applying for Medicaid as a supplement because with a high deductible of $15,000 they didn’t realize that they would continue to pay until the deductible amount is met. This is out of control.

Healthcare is an important access we hold, but an issue is that not everyone can have that access to the healthcare they need. There are many arguments regarding the United States adopting a universal healthcare system. Although the universal system may reduce the quality of care the people receive, there are too many people not able to get any kind of care. Therefore a universal healthcare system would be more beneficial to the citizens of the United States than the limited access of care we have today.

The high cost and low quality of the current system creates the obvious reality that the status quo is failing. The government has tried a free-market and universal approach to the issue, and they have both failed to accurately combat the current problems. A Single payer system may, in fact, increase taxes, but it would help business which, in turn, would help the American economy as a whole. A single payer system is an effective way to completely eradicate the current problems. The issue of climbing premium would no longer be an issue under Single Payer policy, as it effectively circumvents the issues with risk in the health insurance market. Single Payer health care is also much cheaper overall than the currently implemented or any previously implemented system in the United States.The inefficiencies and deprivation of human due to for-profit health care systems must come to an end, and a single payer system must be signed into law because many people have had and will have their lives abused and ruined by the current

The first premise is the biggest argument against universal health care. It is going to cause an increase in our taxes.

I believe the government needs to play a key role in aiding the uninsured. Our country's core value is “life, liberty and pursuit of happiness.” I believe healthcare is applied to this core value with governments helping insure United States citizens. The United States government is already very involved with insurance with Medicare and Medicaid. Medicare is already the second largest provider for insurance, covering 43.5 million in 2013. If Medicare and Medicaid was not available it would leave millions insured. If these millions had no insurance it would likely lead countless health problems in United States.These programs are specifically targeted to individuals who have no access to insurance or can not afford insurances. Market forces want to provide health care, but to me the main purpose is more profit based If market forces are running insurances they are likely to put their money first and then provide health care. Affordable health care for those may not really be affordable and if the insurance is affordable its coverage may not be

Health care should not be considered a political argument in America; it is a matter of basic human rights. Something that many people seem to forget is that the US is the only industrialized western nation that lacks a universal health care system. The National Health Care Disparities Report, as well as author and health care worker Nicholas Conley and Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP), strongly suggest that the US needs a universal health care system. The most secure solution for many problems in America, such as wasted spending on a flawed non-universal health care system and 46.8 million Americans being uninsured, is to organize a national health care program in the US that covers all citizens for medical necessities.

Firstly, universal health care would allow for everyone to get the necessary care they need regardless of their medical problem or financial background.

Over the last few centuries and many presidents, there have been different views on how health care should be provided. For some presidents, it was the citizen’s responsibility to purchase health care and others thought health care reform was needed to help fund and subsidize further government initiatives. The U.S. does not have a constant health care system nor universal coverage for all citizens, but has recently endorsed statutes requiring health care coverage for all people, also known as the Affordable Care Act of 2010 or Obamacare. In 2014, 48 percent of health care spending was private, 28 percent coming from households, and 20 percent coming from private businesses. In 2014, there were 283.2 million people living in the United States with 89.6% having some sort of health insurance coverage; 66% of workers covered by a private health insurance plan. Among the 115.4 million people who were insured, 36.5% of the population received coverage through the U.S. government by Medicare, Medicaid, or the VA. In 2014 alone there were 32.9 million people with no sort of health insurance (DPE, 2016). In the span of 16 years from 1997 to 2013, the United States doubled the amount of money spent per person on health care, about $8,713 or 16.4 percent of its Gross Domestic Product. The second highest was the Netherlands at 11.1 percent and average is 8.9 percent. Generally

Universal healthcare for everyone would save the lives of children whose parents can’t afford to pay for their insurance. As many as 29,000 children die everyday, 21 minutes apart. The lives of those children could be saved by having free healthcare for everyone. Not just children are being affected by not having insurance, homeless, hard working, and elderly people struggle everyday to survive. Citizens can get free treatments for basic conditions without the fear of not being able to afford them. This can help reduce the spread

The lack of health care for all in America is fundamentally a moral issue. The United States is the only industrialized nation that does not guarantee health care to all of its citizens. While other countries deem healthcare to be a basic right, the United States treats health care as a privilege (Universal Health Care). Healthcare is a fundamental right that should be guaranteed to all. A radical change in the current system and the implementation of a single payer universal healthcare system can provide healthcare access to all in the United States.

As Bernie Sanders once said, “Health care must be recognized as a right, not a privilege.” Most developed countries choose to live by this quote while the United States of America chooses to go against it. Universal health care has benefits on multiple levels, whether it’s a single individual or the people in a whole. The U.S is one of the few developed countries that doesn’t offer universal health care to their people, yet the U.S spends more than seventeen percent of their GDP on health insurance. Many people believe that universal health care is a simple one solution problem, but the truth is that there are multiple forms of universal health care that provide all citizens with the health insurance they need.

But we already pay for healthcare in our taxes collectively and to insurance companies individually, and it's costing us dearly. We hear stories every day now about how someone died because they couldn't afford their medication or treatment. Of people suffering for years because they couldn't afford to see a doctor. We see the wasteland of suffering that our current system has given us, and we can't let the fear of change keep us from doing better, for all of our sakes.

Health care cost has seen to increase gradually as years go by. This has been influenced by major factors such as political influence, emerging chronic diseases, new procedures that are coming up including the technologies being invented for treating illnesses, pricing of medicines and treatment is not regulated and when treating ailment their may arise repetition of tests or a patient gets over treated for a particular ailment.