Do you support the Health Care bill?
Posted on 24. Mar, 2010 by Bharat in Opinion
US Senate and President Obama, just passed the Health Care bill this week. The Bill introduces a lot of restrictions and limitations on what the Health Insurance companies can and cannot do. You can go here to see exactly what the changes are along with their timeline.
What I really wanted to get focus on is what I feel about the bill itself. Although I have been an ardent supporter of the health Reform Movement and Obama’s efforts in this area, i am having a hard time fully supporting the bill that just passed. If there was a public option in the bill, I thought it would be the perfect thing to do. Requiring people to pay for insurance from a private company is unconstitutional. If the government was providing health care and says I have to pay extra tax or a fee for it like Medicare or Social Security, then yes, it is legitimate and I have problem with that. But telling me that I have to pay a private company for a service that I might or might not need is just not acceptable.
Some people will say that its the same as paying tax for roads etc, you cannot say that you will not use the roads and hence not pay the tax. In that case, the government is laying the roads and so I can understand that I have to pay for it.
To put it perspective, Medicare runs on a 3% overhead, non-profit insurance companies have around 16% overhead and the private companies around 20%. So paying for Medicare is not the same as paying the other companies. There is a lot of overhead, usually unnecessary and not to mention the huge pay packages for the upper management of these companies. I think by giving more money to the private insurance industry, the country is digging itself into hole. Eventually, when/if US government tries to provide the health care directly, it will be that much more difficult to accomplish that.
When I came here from India, my first concern was maintaining my health. I did not have insurance as I could not afford it at the time, and so I had be careful not to hurt myself etc. Back at home, even though my Mom was a doctor and worked in government, we seldom went to a government hospital. Yes, there is corruption and government hospitals lack some of the advanced medical facilities, but just having a public option is much more relieving. India I think is a perfect example of private health providers and public ones to co-exist. The private hospitals know that if they charge ridiculous prices for services, people will opt for the government care, so they tend to put their prices in check.
At the end of all this, I still support this bill but was expecting a lot more from the president. I hope he and the rest of the democrats keep this up and make this country better and just may be, we will see a public option some time in the future.
