The baseline goal of health care reform is to provide quality care to the maximum number of people at an affordable cost. Seems obvious, but in the endless debate about public versus private, death panels, the heavy hand of government or rapacious health insurance companies that basic goal vanishes into verbiage.
To this end, this article about the Swiss system is a useful tonic. It has the flexibility of a private system, with the proviso that requires everyone to carry insurance and sets basic parameters regarding profitability and costs of coverage. Of course there are problems–how could there not be? Cost to individual citizens tends to run high, and there is some friction between doctors and insurance companies about allowable procedures. Still, the overall cost of the system is far below ours, and the quality of care is generally high. These virtues entitle the Swiss system at least to a hard look.
Thanks Pat, very interesting idea. The cost benefit seems uncertain, but it certainly advances universal coverage. Seems the bottom line is universal coverage would be paid for by requiring the uninsured to get insurance, the logic of that is uncertain to me. Or maybe it is supposed to lower costs because the government is setting reimbursement rates? The ratio of healthcare costs to per capita income is actually higher in Switzerland than here, not sure if that is really the question though. Probably need to compare compensation rates by procedure to see if their system is driving out more costs. The trouble with big picture healthcare cost measurements, like percent of GDP, is that more affluent nations across the board choose to spend more on healthcare. That isn’t a prima facia evil. The real question is a cost comparasion of deliverables, like drug and procedures.
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