How should health care be finance so that everyone has access?

Answer 1

For many reasons, I believe that people should pay for their own care BUT that it is to society's benefit if we have catastrophic care insurance so that people who fall seriously ill will not be bankrupted. There can be significant advantages to having health insurance and peace of mind should be one that is standard across the board. Unfortunately, that is not the way it is in the US. More than half of all bankruptcies are over medical bills and 75% of those folks have insurance, so it's clearly not doing its job. "Aldrich's situation is "asinine" but increasingly common, said Dr. Deborah Thorne of Ohio University. Thorne, co-author of a widely quoted 2005 study that found medical bills contributed to nearly half of the 1.5 million personal bankruptcies filed in the U.S. each year, said that ratio has likely worsened since the data was gathered. ... Like Aldrich, Thorne said, three-quarters of the individuals in the study who declared bankruptcy because of health problems were insured." http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20201807/ Because we also have millions on government run plans (such as Medicare, Medicaid, and SCHIP) I think it is to the taxpayer, patient, and doctors' advantage to correct the numerous problems within those systems and transfer them to catastrophic care WITH one physical per year, one follow-up, and one ER visit (if needed) for reasonable co-pays. All of this to be provided for a reasonable premium cost that is sliding-fee scale based so that everyone can afford to be ensured. This may sound like it would cost more than now, but it should not because by not contributing towards unnecessary visits (paying for the sniffles), following other cost cutting measures outlined in the book, reducing the cost of prescription drugs (no "donut hole" nonsense either!) we could get better health care for no more than we spend now. This plan is outlined in Cassandra Nathan's new book: Save America, Save the World. You can read the basics of this plan, which includes how to fund it, at: http://www.booklocker.com/books/3068.html