The United States continues to spend significantly more on health care than any country in the world; however, even though with this statistic the United States has a lot of uninsured and does not have the healthiest citizens. The lack of universal healthcare coverage in the United States has been a forefront issue. With the overwhelming amount of uninsured Americans and the past unsuccessful efforts of health care reform, the possibility of universal health care seemed to be very unlikely. The new healthcare reform bill that was recently passed under Obama’s administration anticipates covering 30 more million of the uninsured (Riegelman, 2010). However, this bill does not offer universal healthcare. While excellent medical care is available in the United States, the rising cost and the U.S. health care delivery system present many challenges for the consumer and lawmakers. This paper addresses four dimensions that are pivotal to the successes and failures of the system: cost, efficiency, quality. The cost of the U.S. health care system is higher than any country in the world. Its efficiency is also under heavy scrutiny. If it were not an emergency most physicians would require insurance verification. Therefore, patients would be delayed of treatment. Moreover, The healthcare system in the U.S. should be redesigned in terms of prevention rather than treatment when people are already sick. Insurance should not go higher for people that have pre-existing conditions or with more health risks. Prevention and portability of coverage are the main important aspects of the new health care reform.
Current health care system in the United States compared to other nations.
The cost of health care in the U.S. is the highest in the world today. The United States spent $4,178 per capita on health care in 1998, more than twice the Organization for Economic Co-operation (OECD)