Health Care Reforms - Essay Example

Health Care Reforms According to Article 25 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, everyone is entitled to a standard of living that involves adequate accessibility to proper health care and as well as food, clothing, housing and other fundamental social services. However, presently there are disparities and inequalities when it comes to accessibility of proper health care among different societies in America. This has therefore, called for a heightened efforts and measures by the American government to address the health care system that has been described as imperfect compared to other developed nations’ health care systems.

The debate ensuing has generated interest from policymakers in America, fronted by different administrations including the Bush and Obama administrations, to develop health care initiatives that are universally accessible to all Americans as popularly referred to as Health care reforms (Kronenfeld, and Michael,112). The clamor for health care reforms in America has been necessitated by inefficiencies in its health care system. The high health care spending by federal government, the significant number of uninsured population, the ever rising health care costs, increasing health premium rates are just among other factors fueling the need for health care reforms in America.

Thus, health care reforms are basically meant to increase access to healthcare, reduce cost of healthcare, improve the quality of health care and increase the population under insurance cover. Debates regarding healthcare reforms have recently gained ground in the Obama administration. This is because of his initiatives on equal health care for all Americans culminating in the signing into law both The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010, in March 2010.

Besides this, the laws also aim at subsidizing insurance premiums, prohibit denial of coverage and denial of claims based on pre-existing conditions, lower drug costs for Medicare and Medicaid and slowing the steady rise of health care costs. The Bush administration also made significant strides in health care reforms and some of his achievements during his tenure include addition of prescription-drug benefit to Medicare. This helped in bringing down drug cost at the same time providing coverage to senior citizens.

He also introduced Health Saving Accounts which changed consumer behavior with increased subscriptions. However, Bush is criticized for turning a blind eye to addressing structural health care problems of which the Obama administration is trying to address through his Acts. The intended fundamental implication of all these health reform initiatives is to improve the quality of medical care, reduce its costs and provide insurance to all Americans at affordable prices and eliminate inefficiencies and inequalities in the health care sector (Longest, 123).

According to Harrington and Carroll (73) components of equitable health care system that must be redressed to ensure equal health care for all include financing, insurance, delivery and payment. In a government run health care system, these components are more closely integrated and unified. Even developed countries like Canada have not been spared of immense challenges of socialized medicine. Some of the challenges Canada is facing in its model health care system are; prolonged waiting time for treatment, doctor’s shortage and lack of necessary care.

In America, Massachusetts is a case study of when these reforms are not addressed promptly and adequately could pose immense challenges. It implemented its health care reforms in 2006. In recent times, Massachusetts has experienced rising health care costs and increased subsidies that are expensive and experts predict it could be unsustainable over time. The health care reforms it implemented include Medicaid expansion, massive premium subsidies for the poor, a state regulated health insurance exchange.

Skeptics have raised concern that Obama’s health care reform initiatives which he put into law in 2010 could follow into the Massachusetts way. One of the provisions singled out is the state-run insurance exchange (Grover, 67). In a nut shell, the right to access quality health care is a fundamental need for an individual. Thus all Americans irrespective of their geographical, racial and social class should access promptly quality health care regardless of the time the need arises and this has subsequently calls for a complete equitable health care system.

However, its challenges must also be addressed wholesomely to prevent any future drawbacks. Apart from being the leading in pharmaceutical and medical devices manufacture, America also boast of excellent doctors in the world. Because the American health care system has been described as flawed compared to other developed countries globally, this has increased calls for government to takeover health care system from the private institutions (Patel and Rushefsky, 53). It must be noted that Americans have better access to basic health care as compared to Canada.

For instance Americans spend less time waiting for care, they also have better access to treatment for chronic illnesses and preventive cancer screening, easier access to better technologies like image screening devices and much more. These among other facts must form basis for debate on equitable health care for all Americans. To stop the issues of imbalanced access to health care, the government and citizens must unite to bring out the key issues that affect the health care system. Work Cited Grover, Jan.

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