Quiz Time

Take this Quiz. See how you do. Then, consider the answers and they affect you. Maybe now we can see why our health care system is so ineffective.

Health Care for All-How it Works

In Europe, Universal Health Care works. A new series on NPR details this. What do you think? Should we follow these plans?

What now?

Now that Obama won the election, how will that effect health care? We wrote about his plan here.  When can we expect something to be done? In all honesty, probably not anytime soon. The economy is the main focus of the new administration. However, if and when that is solved, they can move over to health care. With a Democratic President and a largely Democratic House and Senate, we feel that it will be easier to pass his plans. What do you think?

California One Video

Does this effectively eliminate unfair spending?

How will California “get there”? What will be the steps?

Tell us in the comments

California

California developed a new form of health care under Senator Sheila Kuehl called California One care. This coverage is universal, covering everyone in California and will even save the state money. This coverage eliminates deductibles, co-pays and pre-existing conditions. California’s senator says this coverage will cover everybody with the same money being put into the faulty system now. 30% of our money going towards coverage goes to cover “administrative costs”. (paperwork, sales and ads promoting the company, shareholder profits, and large payments towards the CEO’s and executives) The rest is considered “medical losses” which go to the Health coverage providers. Each year that 30% lost (around 20 billion a year) will help cover everybody.

Universal Coverage

The United States should be in full support of Universal Coverage. Compared to the other G8 countries (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, United Kingdom and the US) the United States has the lowest life expectancy. Since not everyone is insured, they aren’t getting treated the way they should to live a longer life. If the United States switches to Universal Health Coverage, the amount of money that is being spent will lower as well. But the most important thing is that the total population of people with insurance will rise. According to a graph from 2000, only 45% of the country has health coverage unlike most other industrialized countries where they have 100% of their people insured. Again, we ask you to write to your congressman or woman, and tell them about the health care plight. They will listen. We appreciate your support.

Rising Costs

The US is the only country without Universal health care. We think it’s amazing that the US spends the most on health care in the world, yet a ton of people are not covered. People can do very little to control costs. Some people who need surgery or health care can simply not afford it. Some people are going bankrupt from paying for healthcare for them and their families. An estimate shows that about 2 trillion dollars will be spent in the US on medical care this year, ($6,830 per person). In 2002 Americans spent on average $5,267 per person. The rising costs are  rising, way too quickly, and it needs to stop. The next country with the greatest costs is Switzerland, where people on average are spending $3,446 per person. As this shows, the US health care plan has  to go, and at this rate, predictions tell that in 2015 people will be spending $12,300 per person. 
Please, help us by taking action and really fighting for a new health care plan, fighting for the Dennis Kucinich plan to get new health care in our nation… we all know it is desperately needed.

How you can help

By now, I’m sure you would like to help. It’s quite easy.

Write your congressperson. Email addresses and mailing addresses can be found here.  Tell them about this website, and your concerns or fears about health care. It takes about 10 minutes, and one letter can make a huge difference.

A quick thought about McCain’s Plan

John McCain offers a $5000 tax credit to pay for health care costs. But, is this a mandated cost that has to go towards health care? Or can it be taken for other means? If anyone knows, share in the comments.

Analyzing Health Care differently

Very, very interesting article in the New York Times today. An Op-Ed piece written by Billy Beane, Newy Gingrich, and John Kerry says that the best way to fix health care, is to analyze differently. Analyze it like baseball teams do. Many teams use ‘Sabermetrics’, which is a number of cutting edge statistics, that don’t show up in the box score in the papers. So why not apply this to health care? Makes sense. By analyzing stats, you can make more informed decisions, rather than just throw money around.