The essay by Alyssa C. Mixon printed in the 5/29 edition of the Bedford Journal shows that the writer is an impressive young adult. She is clearly a smart young woman and no doubt has a bright future ahead of her. The essay deals with the details of the Obama universal health care proposal in very technical terms and she is clearly fully behind the plan. Unfortunately, the piece fails to face the reality of socialized health care as implemented in other nations.
No matter how the Obama health care is framed or what stipulations are made, there is no way to get around the fact that Obama’s health plan would be a giant step toward the federal government running health care in America. The current free enterprise system is not perfect, and there are plenty of aspects that require remediation, but government intrusion will not be the cure.
The Canadian, UK and other nations’ government-run health care systems both suffer from the same maladies: rationed care, inferior care and long waits before doctor visits. There is no doubt that a step in the direction of government-controlled health care would bring those unfortunate features to our system.
The British National Health Service performs only 25% of the CT scans per capita compared to the U.S. British heart surgery amounts to 25% per capita compared to the U.S. Kidney dialysis and transplants are performed at a level of 20% per capita of the U.S. rate. In the U.S. about 5% of all patients must wait longer than four months for surgery. Compare that to 23% of Australians, 26% of New Zealanders, 27% of Canadians and 36% of UK patients. The statistics clearly show that government-run health care reduces the amount of care that is delivered and increases the wait times of those in need.
Some may argue that other nations have better preventative care. Not true. U.S. women receive twice the per capita amount of mammograms than in Canada. It follows that the mortality rate for breast cancer in Canada is 25% higher than in the U.S. Also, the proportion of Canadian women whom never had a pap smear is three times that of the U.S. Troubling statistics also exist for the Canadian mortality rates of prostate cancer, colon cancer, diabetic high blood pressure and other ailments.
The biggest argument for socializing U.S. health care is that is supposed to equalize health care across the social strata. Thirty years after the founding of the British NHS an official task force found scant evidence that it had equalized access to health care. In Canada, it is clear that wealthier citizens have faster access to better health care than the poor. They also can travel to the U.S. for the superior health care that exists in today’s free market system.
Before believing the Obama plan will improve on our current system the American people need to learn about how other nations’ nationalized health care systems have fared.
Stephen A Poschmann is a member of the Bedford Republican Committee