Healthcare in America: Just How Sick Is It?

Greetings, friends and family!

One of the hottest topics in America today is our "healthcare system." No matter who you are...man or woman...young or old...rich or poor...liberal or conservative...you have an opinion on the state of "healthcare" in America...and it more often than not will be in conflict with the opinion of the person standing next to you. Unfortunately, because this is such a personal topic that affects nearly everyone at a visceral level, it is a debate that is rapidly devolving into shrill screaming matches split along the lines of political philosophies. This sort of self-serving, ego-stroking, intellectually dishonest conflict does nothing to resolve the issue and serves only to empower the 'healthcare pimps' on both sides who use the fear and uncertainty of the issue to make themselves rich.

Starting today, I want to take a clear, concerted look at the issues we're facing and see if I can't come up with some suggestions for improving the American "healthcare system." I will be using information and data from many different sources, including (but not limited to) the U.S. Census Bureau, the World Health Organization, the American Medical Association, personal experience, and the personal experiences of family and friends. At the end of the day, I believe that a reasoned, rational, intelligent plan of attack can be developed that will work infinitely better than any of the plans created by our political heroes whose primary concern is pandering to their contributors and supporters and other special interest groups.

The first thing to do is to define the problem. You may have noticed that I've been putting "healthcare" and "healthcare system" in quotation marks. This is because those two phrases can have different meanings to different people. For this analysis, here is how The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language defines them:

health-care - noun
1) the prevention, treatment, and management of illness and the preservation of mental and physical well-being through the services offered by the medical and allied health professions.
- adjective
2) of, pertaining to, or involved in the healthcare field.

health-care sys-tem - noun
the group of professionals, offices, clinics, hospitals, and other institutions concerned with the prevention, treatment, and management of illness and the preservation of mental and physical well-being.

Next time, I'll continue establishing the parameters of this discussion. Please bear with me; it will get better.

Until then, best regards...



© James P. Rice 2009