I am a physician and I like Obamacare. I often see patients who postpone or avoid vital care due to the cost and to lack of insurance. The No. 1 cause of bankruptcy in our country is medical expenses and the majority of those people actually have insurance. Our country has one of the most ineffective medical care systems in the developed world. Granted, one can get the absolute best medical care in the world in the U.S., but only if you have money. When looking at the effectiveness of medical care on the population as a whole we do poorly. We spend, by far, the most per capita on health care in the world. Even so, the U.S. ranks No. 15 in the world in life expectance, No. 22 in cervical cancer, which is a preventable disease with routine medical care. We are the sixth most obese nation in the world but rank No. 22 when it comes to malnutrition. We rank No. 135 in total cancers and No. 190 in Alzheimers disease!
Obamacare will give access to health care for many who have not had it before. Just because someone is poor or unemployed should not mean they have to suffer and die from treatable conditions. I would gladly pay twice the amount of taxes that I pay now if it meant everyone could have access to good health care. It is a reasonable cost of being a responsible member of the society I live in.
Lastly, Columbia University’s Earth Institute actually does a survey to see which nations have the happiest people and eight of the top 10 were in Europe. Rounding out the top 10 were Canada and Australia. The United States ranked No. 17. The link to the study is edition.cnn.com/2013/09/09/business/earth-institute-world-happiness-rankings/index.html. Even if one questions the study, there is no study that indicates Europeans are “some of the most unhappy people” around.
Leonard DuPree
Everett
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