A Surgeon's Case for Universal Health Care

If every other industrialization nation and Massachusetts can do it, so can the feds

By Rebecca Smith Hurd, Newser User

Posted Jan 19, 2009 7:02 PM CST

(Newser) – If Americans are smart, they'll learn from other nations—and Massachusetts—in building a system of universal health care, writes surgeon Atul Gawande in The New Yorker. The rise of health reform "is surprising and instructive" in nations like the UK and France, which made controversial changes after too many "stories about cruelty," Gawande writes. Now it's America's turn to stop fearing the “unintended consequences of drastic change."

What's more, the US can build on any of its "hodgepodge" of institutions—like Medicare and veterans' health care—to build an American-style form of universal care. Massachusetts' plan has worked well, despite some grousing taxpayers, since it kicked in 2 years ago, Gawande writes. He hasn’t seen a single patient delay cancer treatment due to cost: “That’s a remarkable change: a glimpse of American health care without the routine cruelty.”

[Images (2)]

[Quotes (1)]

Dominique Entzminger, a physician assistant of family medicine, wears a stethoscope during an examination at a health center in Massachusetts. (Getty Images)

Dr. Maura Shea examines patient Michelo Cineas at the Codman Square Health Center in Dorchester, Mass. The state is the first to require all its citizens have some form of health insurance. (Getty Images)

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Every industrialized nation in the world except the United States has a national system that guarantees affordable health care for all its citizens. Nearly all have been popular and successful.
- Atul Gawande, cancer surgeon

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COMMENTS

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Showing 3 of 6 comments

Guest

Mar 12, 2009 3:49 AM CDT

Just dump the sick. Leave them out! Oh wait, we already do...

riffran

Jan 21, 2009 6:01 AM CST

Yeah it may be good enough for the troops, but the big difference is.........compliance.......Your average soldier is young healthy and fit, and if they are doing something that affects that , they can be ordered to stop it.....or else, .....by anybody of suficient rank, and if they don't they can and are punished, either with loss of money, rank, or given extra duties, and even restricted to the base or barracks or ship ect.......and if they are persistant in their non-compliance they are either booted out, or in some cases imprisoned at a federal pen, then after time served, booted out....that is a hell of a deterant, to stop drugging and drinking. seen plenty of fellow sailors go down that route, with weight or drug alcohol related issues and even mental health issues, and that issue is in all the military.......Now try to tell a civilian, if you don't take your insulin, we will put you in jail, after 10 visits to the "free" clinic for non-compliance, and they still won't do it, and laugh in your face on every further visit, and complain that your not helping them, as there toes are falling off.........If everybody that received "socialized" medicine would actually do as they are instructed......absolutely it would work....but until then, your argument does not hold merit......sorry

Guest

Jan 20, 2009 11:12 PM CST

Hear hear!

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A Surgeon's Case for Universal Health Care