The US Health Care System

Changing Landscape of U.S. Health Care
The landscape of the US health care system through the ACA has changed substantially. 20 million more Americans have obtained health coverage as a result (Somanader, 2016). However, many premiums have gone up for others and health care on the whole has become more expensive. The main reason for the rise in costs is that with more people being covered, somebody has to foot the bill—and with government subsidizing care, the costs are going to go up (this is a basic law of supply and demand—the more demand there is with dwindling supply of service, the greater the cost becomes) (Goldhill, 2009).
Specific initiatives that have been funded include the expansion of Medicaid in various states so that more people can obtain coverage. However, the ACA is likely to meet its demise as more and more insurers pull out of the system and fewer people can obtain coverage. It is currently already in a death spiral and with the Trump Administration signing legislation that allows people to skip buying insurance without facing a penalty there will be fewer people signing up for care which will further cause insurers to pull out of the system. Premiums will continue to rise until the system collapses under its own weight. A new landscape will have to be developed so that health care can be quality, preventive, and affordable—and that should be the goal of this current administration. The ACA helped get coverage for many new people in the system, but it did not correct problems that already existed, such as subsidization, rising costs, and focus on treatments instead of prevention. Those are the issues that will have to be addressed in the coming years because currently the health care landscape is far too expensive and rocky still.
References
Goldhill, D. (2009). How American health care killed my father. Retrieved from
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/09/how-american-health-care-killed-my-father/307617/
Somanader, T. (2016). A look at six years of the affordable care act. Retrieved from
https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/blog/2016/03/23/look-six-years-affordable-care-act