Medical system that allows 18,000 to die yearly is

I have received many e-mails concerning the present health care reform debate. I can classify most of what I have received as “myth” or, more accurately, “scare tactics.”

A doctor friend of mine wrote a letter to a local newspaper claiming that America has the best health system in the world. The truth is that the U.S. has the most expensive health system, not necessarily the best.

America’s health system spends a higher portion of its gross domestic product than any other country; however, it ranks 37th in performance among 191 countries, according to a report by the World Health Organization (WHO).

The United Kingdom, which spends merely 6 percent of its gross domestic product on health services, ranks 18th.

The WHO’s assessment was based on five indicators: the overall population’s level of health; health inequalities within the population; the overall level of the health system’s responsiveness to the population; distribution of responsiveness within the population (how everyone gets treatment); and the distribution of the health system’s financial burden within the population (who pays the costs).

T.R. Reid is a veteran foreign correspondent for The Washington Post. In his 10th book, “The Healing of America: A Global Quest for Better, Cheaper, and Fairer Health Care,” he traveled to various countries to study their health care systems.

Reid makes two important contributions to our present debate. First, the national health care systems enjoyed by residents of every other developed country are superior to the fractured health care industry that serves Americans. They are cheaper, cover everyone and no evidence exists indicating they produce worse outcomes.

Second, these national health care systems are all different. Some are socialized, while others are not. Some are single-payer and some are not. Some are private and some are not.

Reid visited France – home to the world’s top-ranking health care system – to see what that country is doing right.

“The French private insurance system covers all 61 million residents of France, with excellent health results,” he said. “There’s no ‘in-network’ or ‘preauthorization’; you can pick any doctor or hospital in France, and insurance has to pay the bill. Doctors are required to post their prices on the wall of the waiting room, so the mystery of American-style medical billing is removed.

“Everyone in France has a green plastic card,” the journalist continued. “That card has completely replaced paper billing and medical records. The result: administrative costs of 3 percent, compared to 25 percent in the U.S. While France has achieved 100 percent digital record keeping, the U.S. is years behind on this technology.”

Reid goes on to say, “First, our system is so expensive and inefficient that we can’t afford it anymore. It’s a big competitive disadvantage for U.S. industry.

“Second, Americans are too decent and too generous to accept a system that leaves tens of millions of our fellow citizens without access to health care.

“According to the Institute of Medicine, about 18,000 Americans die each year because they can’t get the medical treatment that would save their lives. That’s morally unacceptable,” Reid concludes.

The impact of failures in health systems is most severe on the poor everywhere. It is these who are driven deeper into poverty by lack of financial protection against ill health. The rich and those who benefit from the present system are using scare tactics to influence present legislation.

In America, we believe that every child has a right to a basic education. As an unmarried person without children, I pay taxes that go to the education of other people’s children. It is for the common good that everyone has an opportunity to get a good education.

What about health care? Does every American have a basic right to good health care? I think so.