Too often, problems of crime, mental health, and disease are swept under the proverbial rug. Tens of thousands of Americans are slaughtered in their own streets – by other Americans – through uncontrolled crime (against which threats of terrorism pale). About 37,000 others perish each year in traffic accidents. Even so, the most dangerous killer in the U.S. is heart disease (followed closely by cancer) claiming 900,000 American lives annually.
Despite the fact that most Americans die of painful and debilitating diseases, many do not support free health care for every citizen. Although the U.S. death rate dropped significantly since 1960, the five leading causes of death (heart disease, cancer, stroke, respiratory disease, and accidents) accounted for 64% of all U.S. deaths (2007 statistics). Death rates, however, are not distributed evenly throughout the American population. As stated in a 2007 New York Times, editorial entitled "World’s Best Medical Care":
“The United States ranks dead last on almost all measures of equity because we have the greatest disparity in the quality of care given to richer and poorer citizens.”
U.S. Best Health System in the World?
Although America ranks first in both preventive and emergency medical care, in other ways the system is sorely inefficient. Rating poorly in the care of the chronically ill contributes to America's lower overall scores; other industrialized countries (such as Germany, Britain, and New Zealand) have nurses and clinicians to help assist people with chronic diseases. The U.S. also rates badly in obtaining needed medical services and prompt physician care. It also has the worse scores in general medical efficiency. A 2007 report by the Commonwealth Fund called Mirror, Mirror, on the Wall states:
“The most notable way the U.S. differs from other countries is the absence of universal health insurance coverage.”
Even more surprising is that the U.S. ranked only 49th in highest life expectancy compared to other nations; Canada ranked a far higher tenth place (2010). America doesn’t place among the top ten countries in longevity, while Japan and several European countries made it on this stellar list. The Commonwealth Fund report goes on to say:
"This study provides stark evidence that the U.S. health care system has been failing Americans for years."
Comparing U.S. Health Care
Many Americans believe their health care is the world's best. This is not so, although it is certainly among the most expensive. According to the World Health Organization, France wins that great honor (the U.S. places 37th) for providing the best medical care.
Israel is a tiny, powerful country with socialized medicine since its very conception (1948). Today, every Israeli enjoys full health care coverage whether or not they have money. According to Prof. Shlomo Mor-Yosef of Hadassah Medical Organization, statistics show their system is cheaper with better overall care than the U.S. Various procedures from in vitro fertilization to organ transplants are provided freely to citizens. Israelis have higher life expectancies than Americans and lower infant mortality rates (indeed, the U.S. infant mortality rate is among the worst in the industrial world).
Israel’s Ministry of Health regulates a system paid through taxes and provided by government funded (private) health plans. Israel can boast of 32,000 physicians (nearly double the amount of doctors per patient in the U.S.), approximately 9,000 dentists, and 6,000 pharmacists for its population of only seven million people. Eighty percent of Israelis report being very satisfied with their health care.
America's Reluctancy to Spend on Poor
The true dichotomy is that some Americans passionately do not believe in national health care because (1) they feel their tax dollars are wasted on poor people, (2) health insurance should not be made mandatory, and (3) they don’t want to pay for abortion. This is laughable, considering Americans have, in a sense, been doing this all along, only somewhere else.
Ironically, U.S. taxpayers send 3 billion dollars in annual aid to Israel, a prosperous country with both mandatory health care laws and government funded abortion. Financial support of Israel has been an unquestioned (or unknown) given, while affordable health care to every American is not.
Israel, enjoying a higher per capita income than oil-rich Saudi Arabia, receives over one-third of all U.S. foreign aid (as well as annual restitution money from Germany) despite Israel compromising merely one percent of the world's population.
American taxpayers uncomplainingly hand out millions daily to a foreign land, but would give nothing for the future health and welfare of their own people. If this is called incredible generosity or cheapness is hard to say, considering the present negative attitude of some Americans toward their own poor.
The Association of Americans and Canadians in Israel (AACI), an organization representing dual Israeli citizens, is actively fighting Obama’s health plan which requires annual taxation. After all, they are already covered (for free) in another country. This makes their personal opinions understandable. What is not understandable is the resistance of so many Americans who live only in the U.S. With an economy languishing for many years, more people may lose jobs and have no recourse to health insurance.
Sadly, the U.S. remains the only industrialized country without national health care. Admittedly, nothing is more precious than one’s health or life, not even money; in many ways this is a human rights issue. It is tragic when money buys life, yet over 50 million Americans are uninsured (2010) including one in every ten American children, which is absolutely deplorable. The increase is mainly attributed to employer-provided insurance lost during the recession.
U.S. Priority is its Military
While many Americans today worry about the affordability of health care, most Europeans still enjoy free medicine, doctors, hospitals, annual five week paid vacations, long term unemployment benefits, child care subsidy money, and free university education; everyone receives the same things, whether rich or poor, helping to maintain a middle class.Since few Europeans want America’s privatized system, not even after the recent debt crisis in Greece, Europeans are doing their best to continue having a good quality of life.
Instead of realizing the success rates of many other countries, America, the most militarized nation on earth, seems intent on self-sabotage and keeping ironic priorities. The U.S. spends hundreds of billions on wars yet most Americans will suffer and perish, not from terrorists, but from illnesses. America spends more on its military than nearly the whole world combined, and still does not feel safe. With all that fear, it’s no wonder the nation suffers from so much heart disease.
Sources:
Carter, Mary "Heart disease still the most likely reason you'll die" CNN Health, October 30, 2006
Death in the United States NCHS Data Brief, 2007
Countries with Highest Life Expectancy 2010
Alazraki , Melly "Why Americans Lag in Life Expectancy - Even as Health Care Spending Soars" Daily Finance, October 7, 2010
Wolf, Richard "Number of uninsured Americans rises to 50.7 million" USA Today, September 17, 2010
"Israel 22nd Best Country in the World" Shalom Life, August 17, 2010
Israel news Haaretz
Living Outside the USA, Israeli-Americans Blast Unjust US Health Reform Bill, April, 2011
Mitchell, Chris "Israeli Health Care: Model for the US?", CBN News, July 21, 2009
Wilken, Brett, Moral Low Ground, "US Spends as Much on Defense as the Rest of the World Combined"
Beardsley, Elanor "Can the European Welfare State Survive?", NPR, July, 2010
Jason Ma, Demographics race colors Israel’s abortion debate, Religion News Service, June, 2010
Jeffrey Baarg, Comparing U.S. & Israeli Health Care Systems, Physicians News Digest
Paula Marie Deubel - Published author/writer/journalist/poet I've always written under the pen name "P. Mari," an abbreviation of my full name. I have ...
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