Helios Natural Healthcare

Without the good health of its citizens, how strong can a nation really be? If the US people are unable to structure a plan for providing health care coverage to the population, I think we may soon find out. With approximately 47 million US citizens not covered by any form of health insurance, and many more who are under-insured, low-cost preventative care is not accessible by a significant number of us [1]. Instead, many seek care only during crisis in one of our expensive and overcrowded emergency departments. Contrary to the beliefs of some, it is not predominantly the poor who are falling under this statistic. Rather, it is many from the working classes. How did a country with our history of innovation get here, and why are we so bad at managing our health care economy? Does anyone really think it’s acceptable that more than 17% of our gross domestic product is spent on health care [1]? Especially when what we get in return is an infant mortality rate that is higher than that for most other developed countries, and a gap between the U.S. infant mortality rate and rates for countries with the lowest infant mortality that appears to be widening [2]. I think most people would, without hesitation, answer “no” to all of these questions. So why are we having such difficulty agreeing on a plan for health care reform?

I think that there is confusion around the meaning of comprehensive health care reform. Many in the media and government (no finger pointing here) have equated the idea of reform to socialized medicine, and worry that it will both be expensive and take away our freedom to choose private health insurance plans. Over and over again, it has been reiterated by President Obama that this will not be the case. The President admits that health care is complicated, and so, instead of drafting specific proposals, he has set forth general principles and has called on Congress to draft appropriate legislation [1]. These guiding principles are as follows:

• reduce long-term growth of health care costs for businesses and government;
• protect families from bankruptcy or debt that is due to health care costs;
• guarantee choice of doctors and health plans;
• invest in prevention and wellness;
• improve patient safety and quality of care;
• assure affordable, quality health coverage for all Americans;
• maintain coverage when people change or lose their jobs;
• end barriers to coverage for people with pre-existing medical conditions.

John Mackey, co-founder and CEO of Whole Foods, has offered some thoughtful plans for solving our health care dilemma too, which he wrote about in a Wall Street Journal Op Ed. He states in the title that these ideas are an alternative to “ObamaCare,” but I think many of his proposals are well-aligned with the President’s guidelines, and should be seriously considered. They are [3]:

• “Remove the legal obstacles that slow the creation of high-deductible health insurance plans and health savings accounts (HSAs). The combination of high-deductible health insurance and HSAs is one solution that could solve many of our health-care problems.”
• “Equalize the tax laws so that that employer-provided health insurance and individually owned health insurance have the same tax benefits. Now employer health insurance benefits are fully tax deductible, but individual health insurance is not. This is unfair.”
• “Repeal all state laws which prevent insurance companies from competing across state lines. We should all have the legal right to purchase health insurance from any insurance company in any state and we should be able use that insurance wherever we live. Health insurance should be portable.”
• “Enact tort reform to end the ruinous lawsuits that force doctors to pay insurance costs of hundreds of thousands of dollars per year. These costs are passed back to us through much higher prices for health care.”
• “Make costs transparent so that consumers understand what health-care treatments cost. How many people know the total cost of their last doctor’s visit and how that total breaks down? What other goods or services do we buy without knowing how much they will cost us?”

Regardless of anyone’s particular stance or perspective on the issue, I think we can all agree that the status quo for health care in this country is not working. American citizens may not be entitled to health care, but it is likely that we would be better off as a nation if a humanitarian approach to this problem was taken. “The stakes are high,” says Jessie Gruman, PhD, President of the Center for Advancement of Health in Washington, DC. “Essentially this debate is about whether having a bad diagnosis like cancer bankrupts your family, whether people have to choose between feeding their kids and getting health care, whether being sick and losing your job means you also lose your health care. This is what’s on the table. That’s why it’s vital [1].” For those who haven’t yet been affected by health care issues in life, it’s easy to be apathetic at this point. Keep in mind, however, that if too many of our citizens fall, eventually we all do. Let’s get started with the basics for everyone before we’re all feeling the pain.

Health Care Fact Sheet (.pdf)
What You Can Do to Reform Health Care (.pdf)

References:
1. Zablocki, E; Pathways to Healing; Townsend Letter, July 2009, pp. 23-25
2. MacDorman, M and Mathews, TJ; Recent Trends in Infant Mortality in the United States; CDC National Center for Health Statistics Brief; Number 9; October, 2008; http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/databriefs/db09.htm
3. Mackey, J; The Whole Foods Alternative to Obama Care; The Wall Street Journal Opinion Journal; August 12, 2009; http://online.wsj.com/article/SB20001424052970204251404574342170072865070.html