One could expect:
- Lowered salaries
- Less competent practitioners. This is due to government mandates to put out practitioners, just think of the corruption that happens when people who know people get into politics. Competition among applicants decreases in this situation leading to less qualified students and graduates.
- Near halt in innovative methods of treatment etc. due to lack of funding for research and decreased incentive
- Decreased incentive is a beast on its own - it causes a lot of problems
- Horribly decreased reimbursement for all those involved in health care
- Moral Hazard - huge problem with increased demand for services that may not be necessary
- Switch from provider-governed procedures to government/insurance governed services; provider no longer decides what's best for you, the person holding the purse strings does
- What about the chronically ill? They cost a lot... This is mostly speculative, but you can find some articles where certain places have had to cut spending on these patients in order to care of more acute cases.
These are just a few things that I have come across. If you do a good search you can find good reasons why we should not utilize "universal" health care.
For example:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/01/27/nhs127.xml
But beside these articles, and you'll find many supporting universal health care, one has to really think about the consequences of each type of system and those of us that are part of the health care system need to pay special attention to these issues.
Okay, off my soapbox.
I have much much more to say about this so beware!
Hey, first time poster and I'm gonna have to pop my cherry with disagreeing...huzzah!
ok ok so point by point
1) I wouldn't say that every system with universal health care has salaried health care workers. For example, Canada has a fee for service with medical practitioners so therefore they are not really under a salary. So basically, to say health care workers would have "lower salaries" would be wrong because it's really up to the doctor on how many patients they want to see. In fact, in certain types of H.M.O (something very anti-american because lack of real choice) have salaried doctors and are handicapped in the type of procedures they are allowed to do. While in other universal health care systems like Canada, Doctors are not salaried and can have more freedom.
2) Right now there is a shortage in Canada for doctors, pharmacists ect. and yet competition is still VERY high to get into a professional medical program. Although there is a lot of pressure to pump out more medical professionals, to say this would cause "less competent practitioners" is baseless as the competition to get into these schools is on par with American Universities. I'm applying to pharmacy schools in Canada and the gpa average is around 3.6-3.7 for most schools. Medical school is around 3.8 and same with dentists. So basically, same level of competition with USA.
3) There is such a thing as TOO MUCH innovation. So many times there is a new invention/drug that comes out that is NOT clinically superior to its predecessor but costs a bajillion times more. With so much pressure to be "innovative" we see increase of technology but is so expensive and increasing the overall costs to the patients and straining health care costs and the worst part is that there might not even be clinical improvements
4) There's a lot of researchers in systems of universal health care that disagree. Many people try to "best their own" for the sake in improving the overall health.
5) Reimbursement is NOT a problem. Doctors, pharmacists and nurses do not live in poverty in a universal hc system. Doctors especially, they are still in the top income bracket and this myth that reimbursement is a problem is ludicrous.
6) Moral Hazard is a MYTH! Sure, if an office has free pepsi employees are more likely to drink it as opposed to when it's free....but health care is NOT the same thing as free pepsi! Going to the Dr's is a hassle. No one likes it. Just because it's free doesn't mean people line up to use it excessively.
And to condemn people that are cautious is just plain wrong.
There is so much pressure for people to take their own health into their own hands. For example, people are encouraged to be proactive and are encouraged to use their doctors. If someone gets cancer, "it's your fault! you should have had mammograms!" "you have skin cancer?? WHY DIDN'T YOU GET THAT SPOT ON YOUR ARM CHECKED OUT!" ect. So how can the general public know if something is a legitimate health problem or just something normal? The advantage of universal health care, that's free at the point of service, is that they can be precautious and be proactive and NOT worry about money.
If anything, using health care to be proactive will save TONS in the long run. Problems will be detected early and will not develop complications and therefore will not require expensive surgery or other expensive procedures. But if you have to PAY for your hc, people may delay getting things "checked out" or may let conditions become serious before seeing a dr. At this point, some expensive procedure will have to be done and this could have been prevented.
therefore, in short, moral hazard is a myth!
7) It's funny you mention that the purse string holders have all the power this because I was under the impression that HMO's and insurance companies in the United States hold a LOT (and i mean a LOT) of power in what a doctor does. When their main goal is profit, they may make a LOT of medically questionable descions.
In Canada, doctors and pharmacists are PRIVATE. They have autonomy over what they can do and how they want to do it. Since they are PRIVATE enterpeneurs, they can make many independent medical descisons. All the government does is pay them for their fee for service service (doctors) and basically lay out what is covered under the plan.
8) The chronically ill are thankful they live in a universal health care system because thier family is not bankrupt. I would not like to be in a system with the 47 million (or higher?) uninsured or where many middle class families become bankrupt because a loved one got chronically ill.
In canada (i'm sorry I use this as my main example but I have limited knowledge of the N.H.S or other systems) money is one less stress when one gets ill
sorry for the long first post...I should probably get back to studying....
and ps, bring it on!
