Fatal Consequences of the U.S. Health Care System

At present, one of the biggest debates in U.S. healthcare is the idea of universal healthcare. Should healthcare be a right that every citizen has? Are others obligated to pay the way for people to have healthcare? While most people will admit that children should have access to healthcare no matter what, they struggle with the idea that others may need the same help. If you are all grown up, why can’t you get a job to get healthcare? We forget that people get laid-off and lose coverage, or lack the ability to get a job to start with. While the government does its best to provide assistance to the disabled, that coverage can be difficult to get – it takes approval from doctors and a copious amount of supporting evidence to prove that you may need more help than you are getting. As a society, we are very protective and outspoken about what we consider to be our rights, even though we may not be in agreement on what that means.

While people keep looking at healthcare as an issue of rights, some people consider it to be a moral issue. It’s not as much about whether or not a person has a right to healthcare as it is about whether or not I can help them or prevent harm. Each year about 45,000 people die in the U.S. because they lack health insurance. By not helping those individuals, did we let them die? If people were able to see that healthcare could quite literally determine the life and death of a person, would they be less hesitant in providing it? As long as people are dying because they don’t have healthcare, we have an obligation to provide it. I believe that people do have a right to healthcare; my beliefs about healthcare stems from my beliefs about my moral obligations as a person. In the end, our concerns about healthcare shouldn’t be about taxes and financial impact. They should be about how well our system is working. Can we help more people? The debate about universal healthcare should include more than rights and finances, it should include our responsibility and accountability to those in need. We should be held accountable when the lives of others are in danger.