U.S. Health Care System

¶ … wealthiest nation that the world has ever seen is presently witnessing a situation in which over 47 million of its citizens have no health insurance (O'Neill, 2011). This is a number that is staggering but it is also a number that promises to keep growing and it is only the tip of the iceberg in regard to the delivery of health care services in America. As the economic conditions in the United States change, health insurance premiums continue to increase, and businesses alter their practices relative to providing health coverage to their employees the overall health care of the country is in peril.

The availability and cost of health insurance is only one of the problems facing American society relative to health care (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2011). The actual cost of health care has risen geometrically over the past decades to the point that may millions of families delay seeking needed medical care. With the cost of medical care rising at rates five times the rate of inflation the rank and file American faces deciding between medical care and paying the mortgage.

Among the country's most vulnerable, children and the elderly, the health care situation is particularly acute. Children constitute nearly 9 million of the uninsured while the elderly find their source of health care coverage, Medicare, under increasing attack by the national government (U.S. Census Bureau, 2008). As an example, in the latter days of the Bush administration a Medicare prescription bill was passed by Congress that significantly raised the overall prescription costs for the 30 million plus Americans relying on Medicare for payment of their bills (Connolly, 2005).

All of these problems are the result of the fact that the United States spends a higher percentage of its Gross Domestic Product on healthcare than any other industrialized country while at the same time the United States joins South Korea as the only industrialized country that does not provide some form of universal health care to its citizens (Instiute of Medicine, 2009). A large measure of these costs is due to the high costs of technology and prescription drugs but nearly a full third of all health care dollars in America are spent on administrative costs. These high administrative costs have contributed to significant increases in health insurance premiums for those fortunate enough to have insurance and caused many to forego treatment for routine conditions that has resulted in their requiring treatment later on for more serious conditions. The delay results in more expensive procedures being required that could have been avoided through earlier detection and treatment. As it is, most every situation being presented in the application of health care results in not only higher health care costs and, correspondingly, higher insurance premiums.

Solutions to the present health care crisis in the United States are floating around in abundance but none of the offered solutions has met with universal approval. With a rapidly aging population, the United States' health care system is desperate for a workable solution. The aging population will place even more pressure on the system as more and more demands are made for Medicare coverage.