Kaysie Love

Taking Care of Yourself Benefits Everyone

3 May 2020

Introduction to Health Systems

 Part 1

The United States of America does a lot of things very well, however one of

the things it doesn’t do well is health care. Currently, the US has a system that is

driven by the market, this system sees the market setting the prices of services and

making the “ability to pay ration the quantity and type of health care services that

people can consume” (Shi and Singh 76), sees high insurance premiums, high cost of

care, and outrageous prescription costs. A system like this is doomed to make

healthcare largely inaccessible to the majority of a nations citizens, because of such

high barriers of entry. No nation could stay healthy. Systems that are policy driven

and focused on the people rather than corporations are shown to allow for more

access to care that is affordable, while still being of a high quality and being able to

properly compensate physicians.

The system that the US currently has is made somewhat accessible through

owning health insurance policies. Unfortunately these policies usually come with a

high deductible and a high monthly premium. Meaning, you pay a large sum of

money, month to month, and then you have such a high ceiling you need to reach

before the insurance company begins to pay a respectable amount. Once we reach

this level of care, we are looking at tens of thousands of dollars worth of medical

bills. Our current system works in favor of the insurance companies rather than the

people buying the insurance.

Because of this, many citizens elect to purchase the cheapest insurance that

offers the least amount of coverage, if they even purchase insurance at all. This

almost guarantees that people will go bankrupt based off their medical bills alone.
To avoid this scenario many people will ultimately skip going to the doctor, opting

to suffer or tough it out instead of having to pay for the care.

We need to find a way to revise our health care system or throw it out and

start new. Thankfully there have been a few nations who were in the same situation

who have led the way in doing so. In Sick Around the Word PBS reporter T.R. Reid

discusses how Switzerland mandates “that every citizen purchase healthcare while

the government picks up the tab for the poor”. Every citizen has access to affordable

healthcare and it would be national news if someone went bankrupt because of not

being able to pay for healthcare. This system still allows for technological

advancements while still maintaining a certain regulated price for care.

We cannot have citizens that choose not to go to the doctor based on the fear

that they might go bankrupt. If we allow this to happen we are saying that people

don’t have the right to live because they can’t pay for it.

Part 2

To analyze this further, we will use the two viewpoints utilitarianism and

egoism. Utilitarianism is defined as doing the most good for the most amounts of

people. A utilitarianism argument would say that a government mandated

healthcare system that regulates how much public health systems can charge for

care would be beneficial to the most amount of people because it drastically lowers

the barriers that prevent people from having access to healthcare. In my textbook,

Delivering Health Care in America, Shi and Singh state that a system like this allows

basic services may be available to all. They also go on to show that we can already

see a version of a system like this work in the US through publically financed
programs like Medicare, Medicaid, and CHIP. We can also see this through tax

supported country and city hospitals. This is the right thing to do because our

Constitution says that everyone has the right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of

happiness,” access to healthcare is one of the most basic human rights as defined

from that excerpt of the Constitution. The WHO added the right to health care into

their Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948 (Riegelman, Kirkwood 107).

Even though the US hasn’t adopted this to our constitution yet, this could be used as

a basis to do so. This viewpoint argues that because everyone is born with the

unalienable right to live, and healthcare can keep you living it is good for the most

amounts of people. The only way that this viewpoint doesn’t support this topic

would be when someone tries to argue that forcing people to pay for other people’s

healthcare isn’t right and doesn’t do the most good for the most people. An Ultraistic

approach would say, “An unhealthy individual is a burden on society. A person

carrying a deadly infection, for example, is a threat to society. Society, therefore is

obligated to cure the problem by providing healthcare to the individual” (Shi, Singh

76)

The next viewpoint is egoism. Egoism is the belief that the most ethical way

to view any situation is to do what is best for you and to let others do the best for

them. When we do this, we are saying that I will do what ever I can to take care of

myself until I am no longer able to do so. This is great in the sense that in a private

health care system, people could pay for what they want and not pay more or have

to pay taxes for others to have access to care. This viewpoint would mostly argue

that what I have said about this topic is wrong, stating that people shouldn’t have to
take care of other people. This viewpoint supports my topic because “individuals are

not held completely responsible for their condition because factors outside their

control may have brought on their condition” (Shi, Singh 76), but are responsible for

some aspects of their health (Shi, Singh 77). We need to do everything we can to be

healthy as individuals, eat healthy foods, exercise, get plenty of rest, and limit our

exposure to anything dangerous. Until the point where we are in an accident where

we need advanced healthcare, this system would then we accessible to us at a low

cost so we can get back to being healthy again. The individual has the obligation to

society to stay healthy and be a productive member of society and society has an

obligation to the individual to help them get to place where they can continue to

help society. Rudyard Kipling sums it up best with his quote form The Jungle Book,

“For the strength of the Pack is the Wolf, and the strength of the Wolf is the Pack.”

The greatest good for the most amount of people is the most amount of people

possible doing what they can to do be healthy then when we have a system that

would be able to take care of them.

Part 3

The unfortunate part about being a health science major is trying to find the

balance between taking care of the most patients but while still being able to take

care and provide for my family. It isn’t easy and it isn’t cheap to work as a provider

in the healthcare field and so it is easy to feel a battle of trying to help everyone

while still being able to pay back student loans and put food on the table.

The governing document of America states that every single person is

granted the unalienable right to life. Once you are born you have the right to live,
and in order to live we must be healthy and sometimes in order to be healthy we

must go to the doctor. When we go to the doctor and find out we need a life saving

procedure then must find a way to pay for it, our right to life is infringed. If we don’t

receive this life saving treatment we will die, but we know have to work for the rest

of our lives to pay this back. Potentially not being able to pay for necessities like

food or shelter because we have to pay a medical bill. How does this make sense? If

you don’t receive this treatment you die, if you can’t pay for the treatment, you could

have your financial life ruined and as a result not be able to pay for shelter or food

and water. This health care system steals our most basic human right. The answer to

our problem is simple; we need to have a health care system that is affordable and

accessible to all. People are starting to become more health conscious and want to

take control of their health; they want to live healthy. A healthy person can be a

positive contributing member of society and won’t need to receive healthcare as

often. Only needing healthcare in emergency situations or when something is out of

their control. It makes the most sense to get them back to being a positive

contributing member of society. If they don’t have to pay as much for specialized

care that they need or don’t need to pay for generalized care they can potentially

spend more money in areas that can positively affect our economy. No one wants to

be sick and unhealthy, most recognize that they have bills to pay or simply have

things that they want to accomplish so for them it makes sense to do what ever they

can to be healthy. In an article written for Military Medicine Captain Kevin Dorrance

and Alyson Phillips discuss how the creation of our current health care system

serves 20% of the population, focused on the sick and trying to fix them rather than
focusing on preventative care. “High-risk, high-cost and often highly complex

interventions, along with external regulatory forces, further increased complexity at

the point of care. This complexity has now extended to 80% of the population that

has low-risk, low-complexity needs” (Dorrance, Philips 240).

I feel that in conjunction these viewpoints work very well to answer the issue

going on with our healthcare system. A system where everyone does as much as

they can to lead a healthy lifestyle and when they need simple healthcare or even

advanced healthcare it is affordable. This type of system allows everyone to have

access to care but with the limit to extremes of people needing it. We can keep our

country healthy and our physicians and providers paid. The remaining viewpoints

don’t fit my claim and offer no evidence to support, however these two that I have

chosen I feel offer the strongest possible support to any claim.

The biggest issues with my idea would be getting people to buy into living

healthy and paying a higher tax. There would need to be an incentive for people to

live healthy lifestyles, unfortunately I don’t know what could be done. Potentially

larger tax refunds or lowers taxes if you can maintain that healthy lifestyle.

This viewpoint would be very beneficial for the world at large because we

could be a leading example to other countries once again. Show the world how to be

healthy and to have the lowest health care costs and happiest doctors. I strongly feel

this is something that can be attained with a lot of work, but it would be so

beneficial to our nation.

In summary, I have learned to become adaptive when considering these

ethical viewpoints. That being open to change will allow me to make better
decisions and allow me to better care for my future patients. I have learned that a lot

of context can be needed to make a proper and just decision in regards to public

health. I have learned that globally, ethics are different country to country and

currently the US has a different ethical view than most of the world.
 Part 4

Bibliography

Dorrance, Kevin A, and Alyson A Phillips. “Toward a National Conversation on Health: The

Transformative Power of Deregulated Markets and Market-Driven

Innovation.” Military Medicine 183, no. suppl_3 (November 1, 2018): 239–43.

Dorrance, Kevin A, Dennis A Robbins, Linda Kimsey, Jeffrey S LaRochelle, and Steven

Durning. “Toward a National Conversation on Health: Disruptive Intervention and

the Transformation from Health Care to Health.” Military Medicine 183 (November

2, 2018): 193–97.

PBS. Public Broadcasting Service. Accessed May 4, 2020.

https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/film/sickaroundtheworld/.

Reinhardt, Uwe E. “The Pricing Of U.S. Hospital Services: Chaos Behind A Veil Of

Secrecy.” Health Affairs 25, no. 1 (January 2006): 57–69.

Riegelman, Richard, and Brenda Kirkwood. Public Health 101: Improving Community Health.

Burlington, MA: Jones & Bartlett Learning, 2019.

Shi, Leiyu, and Douglas A. Singh. Delivering Health Care in America: a Systems Approach.

Burlington, MA: Jones & Bartlett Learning, 2019.

Works Cited

Dorrance, Kevin A., and Alyson A. Phillips. “Toward a National Conversation on Health: The

Transformative Power of Deregulated Markets and Market-Driven

Innovation.” Military Medicine, vol.183, no. suppl 3, Nov. 2018, pp. 239–243.

PBS, Public Broadcasting Service,

www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/film/sickaroundtheworld/.
Riegelman, Richard, and Brenda Kirkwood. Public Health 101: Improving Community Health.

Jones & Bartlett Learning, 2019.

Shi, Leiyu, and Douglas A. Singh. Delivering Health Care in America: a Systems Approach.

Jones & Bartlett Learning, 2019.