American Health Care Since 1994, Essay Example

In “American Health Care Since 1994”, Ben Furnas discusses the need for American health care reform in addition to how the health care system will be damaged if these changes are not enacted. While the article was written in 2009, many of the concerns indicated in this article are still relevant today in the wake of the Affordable Care Act. President Obama has managed to achieve many of the health care goals discussed by the author in this article. However, this current policy appears to be a compromise between the ideals that are written here and the opinions of health care reform opponents. It is therefore necessary to gain a greater understanding of the nation’s health care needs and to determine which policy modifications can help them be achieved in the future.

The main purpose of this article is to explain how all Americans could achieve “affordable, accessible, and effective health care” (Furnas 1). The author claims that if the policies regarding health care access are not changed in the near future, the cost of care will increase dramatically. According to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services “per-person health care expenditures in the United States haverisen 6.5 percent per year since 2000, and 5.5 percent per year onaverage since 1994” (Furnas 2). Meanwhile, inflation has risen only an average of 2.5% per year. Therefore, families are not earning enough money to afford this price increase. The Affordable Care Act has allowed many families to access affordable health care plans that have supported their ability to access health care. However, it is important to consider that there are many out-of-pocket health related expenses that are not covered by these plans. As a consequence, it is important to continue reforming health care so that all aspects of these services are affordable for all.

A secondary concern that the author has is that “Despite surging expenditures, the number of Americans going without insurance has risento 46 million, or 15 percent of the population in 2007, up from 38 million, or 14 percent, in 1999” (Furnas 4). Fortunately, this statistic is less of a concern in 2015, as the current uninsured rate is 12.9%, and it is expected that this number will drop in the next few years. However, the author’s discussion of declining health care quality remains to be problematic. The author states that “the United Statesas a whole is performing well below the standards of health, efficiency, and care that arerealistic and have been achieved in the most successful U.S. states and other developed nations” (Furnas 4). It is therefore necessary to enact health care reform in a manner that promotes improve quality of care and patient safety. Federal law must be altered in a manner that allows the establishment of national standards for public and private health care organizations. It would be meaningless to equip the American people without insurance if the care that they are being provided with is not beneficial.

In conclusion, there are many aspects of health care that need to be reformed in order to protect the health of the American people. It is necessary to reduce medical expenses, enable more citizens to become insured, and to put regulations in place that will improve the quality of care. While many politicians have been fighting in favor of health care reforms for decades, no major changes have been made. We must therefore bring this issue to the attention of the public so that the will of the majority will be able to initiate change and improve health care for all American citizens.

Works Cited

Furnas B. American Health Care Since 1994. 2009. Web. 9 February 2015.