The Case for Universal Health Care!

Trump: “Like, if you take insurance, they want single payer, which can’t be afforded, and we want really great health care where people get a great price. You know, really great stuff where people get a great price. I mean there are such differences, I could go on, on almost every subject.”

It took a comedian like Samantha Bee to make the simple case for Universal Health Care, and the absurdity of GOP arguments against saving trillions of dollars and American lives:

Private Sector Health Care Ripping off Americans, Part 1,000,001: This is a never-ending story, yet Republicans continue to pretend nothing is wrong. They say shop, be happy! And medical providers say, “hide the real cost,” and that makes them happy, so it’s never going to change.

Universal healthcare is the solution, where both the government and insurers negotiate a standard price for all sorts of care with hospitals and doctors. No gouging, no artificial price increases, complete transparency, no bills, so there are no surprises.

The magic of the free market has allowed the following practice to get completely out of control in more markets:

Dominant hospital systems use an array of secret contract terms to protect their turf and block efforts to curb health-care costs. As part of these deals, hospitals can demand insurers include them in every plan and discourage use of less-expensive rivals. Other terms allow hospitals to mask prices from consumers, limit audits of claims, add extra fees and block efforts to exclude health-care providers based on quality or cost. 

The Wall Street Journal has identified dozens of contracts with terms that limit how insurers design plans, involving operators such as Johns Hopkins Medicine in Maryland, the 10-hospital OhioHealth system and Aurora Health Care, a major system in the Milwaukee market. National hospital operator HCA Healthcare Inc. also has restrictions in insurer contracts in certain markets.