In a sentinel study “REDEFINING HEALTH CARE IN AMERICA: QUANTIFYING UNIVERSAL ACCESS AND A SINGLE-PAYER FINANCIAL SYSTEM” (Sizemore, R., C., 2008) quantifiably analyzed, measured, and contrasted the advantages and disadvantages of universal access and a single, simplified-payer financial system.
The problem: The United States (U.S.) has one of the best health-care systems in the world, although over 61,000,000 residents live without affordable access to health and preventive care because they lack medical insurance or have insufficient insurance coverage. The complexity of the current medical insurance-based financial payment system in the U.S. is driven by Federal, state, public and private insurance conglomerates that design and market a complexity of health insurance products and programs with thousands of plans, options, modifications, exclusions, limitations and escalating costs.
The opportunity: In the referenced study, the advantages and disadvantages of universal access and a single-payer financial system are compared and contrasted with health-care systems that economically compete with the United States (Australia, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom). The analysis of the 14 industrialized nations (included the U.S.) reported reduced infant mortality rates during the first year of life, increased life expectancy at age 65 and reductions in total health-care expenditures as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) within the 13 universal access and a single-payer financial systems when measured against the United States.
Barlett & Steele (2004) additionally proposed a path advancing health-care reform on a national level within the U.S. reported, there is a need for the U.S. to take a fresh approach, a new organization that is independent and free from politics. That focuses with laser-like precision on what needs to be done to further the health interests of everyone in a fair manner, knowing what must be done to advance the health interests of everyone in the U.S. in an equitable manner. Essentially, advocating a tax-financed, Federal Reserve-like system assuring unrestricted access to health and preventive care, strict cost controls, increased practitioner (physician and nurse) incomes that are determined to be too low, addressing geographic (rural) variations, and curtailing over-diagnosis and over-treatment practices (Barlett, D. L., & Steele, J. B. (2004). Critical condition: How health care in America became big business-and bad medicine. New York: Doubleday, p. 239).
The Bottom-line: There are merits to universal access and a simplified payer financial system that need to be addressed, studied, analyzed, quantified, and efficiently and effectively adapted within the best health-care system in the world, the U.S., a system that is NOT currently achieving or deserving of such an accolade.

An opportunity for the “penny-pincher” to serve as health care "emperor" for our nation along with other freedom seeking professionals to set up a free enterprise medical system to stave off socialism, while extending access to an affordable (financially simplified) health and PREVENTIVE CARE system for all U.S. citizenry!

Clark's plan is fine with me with this one caveat: I want to be rewarded for my healthy lifestyle choices. If you're eating yourself to death (fast-food, fast-food, more fast-food) sitting on your butt all day, avoiding annual checkups, ignoring your Doctor's recommendations to exercise more, eat less red meat, cut down on the high caloric carbos, etc., etc., why should I have to subsidize your poor health choices when they finally catch up to you? I live in Ca. where auto insurance is not cheap UNLESS you opt for a higher deductible, and are rewarded by your insurer (in my case State Farm) for a clean driving record. The same 'personal responsibility' test should be applied to health care. Let's incentivise annual check-ups, and healthy lifestyles!

Finally, Clark, you're preaching to the choir here. Testify on Capital Hill if you can. Take your message straight to the Obama administration. I believe you will have a more receptive audience than with prior administrations.

Clark - PLEASE put your plan in writing and start promoting it as an alternative. At least it would be something other than the Obama plan and the health insurance alternatives. And it would do a lot to promote discussion.

YOU GO CLARK!!!!!!

Clark is correct, health insurance should be like auto insurance... The 'oil changes' should not be covered; but, we should be able to compare prices + insist on full upfront and comparitive (apples to apples) disclsoure of realisitic retail pricing from everyone in the health services industry from Doctors, hospitals, pharmacies, labs, etc. I just got a bill for $500 retail that my insurance contract was able to 're-price' to $36. This shows how ridiculous the so called retail rates are and how bad we are getting hosed, especially if you do not have insurance. Give us the info and tools to compare. Dentists compete, so do eye doctors and oil change places where no insurance is involved!
Tort reform is also very necessary.

"We spend twice what other wealthy industrialized nations spend on healthcare.
RIGHT - THEY HAVE socialized medicine.
We have Socialized Libraries, Socialized Fire Protection, Socialized Police Protection, Socialized Roads..why not socialized medicine?
We live 3 years shorter than Canadians, Englanders, French and even Cubans! Does that make you feel better?
It is too high a price, to me.
Watch the movie SICKO about health care in Canada, Great Britain, and France.

See what they really say about their health service. No Service is a Myth created by Insurance Companies and politicians with their hand out.

Health insurance employs over 2500 lobbyist to work 535 elected to the Senate and Congress. WHY??
Do you really look forward to a life that is 3 years shorter??
Socialized medical care is cheaper for citizens of Canada, Great Britain and France than insurance care for us who can afford it. We let children die, young adults die and all sorts of people die from lack of care. Can we really claim to be good Christians and turn our head away from the fact that too many people die or suffer from lack of health care?

If you watch the movie SICKO and after viewing you can still say no to universal healthcare, you will at least be making an informed decision.
Right now you may be against universal health because of fear, or not having known a child or adult who suffered long and hard without healthcare.

But do remember you have Socialized Fire Protection, Socialized Police Protection, Socialized Libraries, Socialized Roads...and the list goes on.

I have a relative who was head of a family practice clinic in a mid-western state. A year or two ago, he told me that, from his point of view, private health insurance and Medicare were about equally a pain in the a$$. He added that Medicare was probably slightly better from the average patient's perspective.

If private insurance can't do better than the government (on average), why shouldn't we just let the government do it? They have been doing Medicare long enough to have a track record and, while it is far from perfect, it hasn't been a disaster either. I have also heard that another "socialized medicine" agency, the Veterans Administration provides both better and more cost-efficient care than Medicare so it is possible to improve.

Funding such a program will cause a big debate and will produce some unhappy people no matter how it is done. I think that, for the sake of simplicity (and consequently lower administrative costs), the funding should be done the same way as Social Security and Medicare -- but I'd be open to other options. Employers should be taken out of the loop as their administrative costs are just an extra burden on the system. They could put that money into higher wages or other benefits instead.

There might have to be some caps on what is covered to contain costs (i.e. medications or procedures for the purpose of "upgrading" one's psyche).
Private health insurance could be available as a supplement for those who want these benefits or other extraordinary care.

There will be lots of details to work out and citizens will have to watch the politicians very carefully to see that lobbyists don't either make it into a hopeless mess or a different profit center, but the time has come to tell this industry that they have had their chance and blew it.

(PS I like Medical Student's views on tort reform/frivolous lawsuits. While there is undoubtably abuse by plaintiffs, large pharmaceutical firms have also been less than ethical in pushing their products and they need to have the possibility of fearsome awards to keep them in line.)

Clark would be perfect.

Let's have a Canadian-style system. Please quit referring to it as "socialized" medicine, because it's not. It's a single-payer, universal health care system. It's not perfect, but it's a lot better than down here. I know because I've lived both here and in Canada. There is no Canadian I know who would trade the Canadian system for what Americans put up with down here. Imagine being able to make life decisions (opening your own business, changing jobs, etc.) without having to worry about health insurance. There are people in the US who are going bankrupt due to medical costs. This system is barbaric and uncivilized.

Clark, if every insurer is selling the exact same plans, where is the competition factor? Wouldn't the lack of diversification of products reduce competition and raise rates?

I am very much against socialized medicine. But....being self-employed, and now over 50, our health insurance became prohibitive, so now we are uninsured. My husband has diabetes so is now virtually uninsurable.

One of my mantras has always been that people are willing to pay $20,000, $30,000 or more for a car, but feel their own health is not as valuable? I really wouldn't mind making payments if we ever needed any major medical care, but why can't we pay the same amount the insurance companies pay? It seems like we, the private payer, have to make up for the difference the gov't or private insurance pays by paying 2-10 x what the hospitals or doctors are compensated by them. Medical care would not be overwhelming if it costs us the same as the insurance companies.

The system is broken, but getting the gov't involved will only make it worse, IMHO.

I am for Universal Health Care. I pay out of pocket $8,000 per year for single health care.
Why not have everyone pay Medicare to the tune of 7% regardless of income. Then have Medicare handle the bills. Companies would like only paying their 7% and nothing more. All would benefit and companies would no longer have to offer health care.

It is time we do not have so many who do not have or cannot have reasonable health care.

We already have socialized medicine really. We pay more for insurance for those who dont. Insurance companies charge an unreasonable amount and make an unreasonable profit. No rewards for wellness. We take 2x the amount of pills as any country on earth but are ranked 37th in health. Why too many pills and not enough responsibility for ones own health. The FDA spends too much time chasing alternative treatments instead of pills. Most studies by Big Pharma are manipulated to the positive. For instance the study for Celebrex was written by an advertising agency prior to the study being done. The study data was then massaged into matching the perfect advertising scenario. We pay for advertising in our drugs. We are basically THE ONLY COUNTRY IN THE WORLD that allows drug ads.

i feel that would should have some kind of
health care. There are some kind of conditions that can,t be prevented or predicted for example I have glaucoma for over 8 years, if insurance companies did,t have the say on how much a person could go to the doctor for exams maybe it could have been caught sooner and cost me less in care.
I have son who is in early 40s who just
found how he has a rare health condition
which if the hospitals and insurance companies could have caught over 20 years ago. I also have a son who is insulin pump depended and in order to keep is health upkeep we have kept him up my husband insurance, so because he is on the insurance he has medicare with the other with a $5000 deductible. If everyone is wondering how about A National SAles TAx at 1.5% to 2% where everyone would be payingD!!!

Do we really want a politician to tell us we can't have a treatment that would save our life because it costs too much? Right now your ability to pay and how good your insurance is determines whether you get the treatment - is that so much better?

I firmly believe that our nation needs serious legal reform. Doctors would not order every test under the sun if they were not worried about getting sued massive amounts everytime something did not go perfect. There is a reason it is called practicing medicine. Unfortunately it is not perfect. The other unfortunate thing is that we are lead by lawyers in this country. Not saying the legal profession is all bad. It isnt' but putting caps on awards would be a nice start. I would imagine if we had legal reform in this area, health costs would go down as would the costs of medicines which have to factor in so much money for law suits, they are afraid of putting more new drugs on the market.

Right now I can't think of one thing the govenment is managing well. Do we really want a politician to tell us we can't have a treatment that would save our life because it costs too much?

Having lived in France and Germany for 3 years, better diet makes all the difference. We here in the US are fat slobs.

First, excellent topic and show as always Clark! I do not consider myself to be a liberal or conservative but perhaps it is good that the Obama Administration is pushing for a comprehensive health insurance plan for everyone, because as you (Clark) said, it is now forcing the insurance czars to reconsider allowing pre-existing conditions as part of their approval process. What good would a so-called "tax cut" do, when one can be shelling out up to $750 to $1,000 a month (especially if they have a serious health condition). I would definitely support Standardized Health Systems that are fair, affordable, and by "ability to pay.' I am sick and tired of hearing about everyone crying about "socialized" medicine that has not come up with any solutions such as you, Clark have here. The insurance companies are really practicing their own "socialism" by dictating what little they compensate the doctors to the point that many just want to shutter their offices. And, the patient is increasingly forced to select a medical professional based on what/if an insurance carrier will cover, if they are lucky enough to have Health Insurance. I also strongly agree with you Clark, that we should be looking at more emphasis on alternative treatments that also work, not limited to the self-interests of the FDA and their lobbyists. At the same time, we also have to monitor the abuses of people that go to the emergency room to treat a head cold. Then, there is the issue of malpractice insurance and the excessive costs that the medical professionals have to absorb, not to mention that many probably are in serious debt from their medical education/schooling. So, to close, I am glad that Obama is pushing through Socialized Medicine for the reasons you, Clark have stated. If preventative measures to stay healthy don't work, and we become unemployed - we are screwed! I hope you continue to talk this up Clark, and to guide us on to group to get through to our politicians who will never have to worry about health care!

If the government made section 125 plans simpler to use and then mandated that only qualified insurance plans could be used -- qualified meaning portability, so the employee could take the plan with him to his next job, and that the insurance company provide a schedule of costs related to the number of people enrolled regardless of employer -- we could allow everyone to belong to a group plan and change jobs as often as necessary. the insurance companies would have an incentive to be competitive and build the plan with the greatest participation. Each employee would look at a new job prospect with a keener eye on the amount available to pay his health insurance through their section 120 plan. As a consultant to small business people for many years I found that very few were familiar with section 120 plans and did not realize the benefits to both themselves and their employees from this vehicle so there would be an educational process involved and perhaps even an enhancement in tax benefits for employers who opt to use the plan.

I agree people should be responsible but cancer hits those that are healthy, young, and are taking care of themselves. It does not discriminate. I can attest as I just went to my friends funeral last year after she died of cancer at the old age of 38 and my brother-in-law (32 years old) who is starting chemo and radiation treatment next week for a second occurrence brain tumor. And he is finishing up his last year of med school at the same time. Both of these people have med bills over 250k. So, although it is convenient to place the cost of health care on those that abuse the system, please also consider the young that are getting very deadly, very expensive diseases that kill them.

"For those who can't afford it, Clark believes that vouchers are perfectly reasonable."
The problem with this, IMO, is how to define "those who can't afford it". If I buy a brand new SUV, buy a house that busts my buget, take the family to Disney World each summer and THEN discover I can't afford health care, do I get a voucher?