Running head: IS UNIVERSAL HEALTHCARE THE ANSWER?
Is Universal Healthcare the Answer?
Kelly Lloyd Ezzell
University of Phoenix
Is Universal Healthcare the Answer?
As America is in a healthcare crisis people are looking for alternatives for relief. One idea is universal healthcare, a system many countries already use. Universal healthcare is “a health insurance program in many countries other than the United States that is financed by taxes and administered by the government to provide comprehensive health care that is accessible to all citizens of that nation (“National Health Insurance”, 2009, ¶ 1).” The idea is not new to politicians but has yet to take part in American lives. Universal healthcare sounds effective until looked into; it has many downfalls that are not told to the citizens. Tough America is in a healthcare crisis, universal healthcare is not the answer because of the lack of funding and, more importantly, the quality of care would be poor.
Healthcare in the United States is through several ways, the census bureau reports “in 2003, 60.4% of the population was covered by employment-based (private) health insurance, 26.6% was covered by government-based insurance, while 15.6% had no health insurance at all (This total is higher than 100% because of the way the survey is taken) (Uretsky, 1996).” 2006 and 2007’s numbers were not much different from each other but the number of citizens insured by their employers increased from 2003. In 2008 the Census Bureau released the percentage of insured and uninsured, the report found “that in 2006 those without insurance coverage was 15.8, privately insured was 67.9, and government insured was 27.0. In 2007 those without coverage was 15.3, privately insured was 67.5 and governmental was 27.8 ( 2008, p. 1).” The following graph shows the percentage of health coverage for 2003, 2006 and 2007,
[pic]
2008 and 2009 are not available because the last data taken...