Access to healthcare as a human right?

[Iantha]

Healthcare should be a right. We are a country who aspires to greatness; greatness starts with how we treat those who need help the most. It can be made sustainable by the myriad benefits that we would get as a society like increased workforce participation leading to increased tax revenue in income taxes and sales taxes as well as more expendable income per family due to lower healthcare costs overall, but I'd like to start from the moral point of let's just give healthcare to everyone here and build it from there with the fewest qualifying factors as possible.

[FlameBlade]

And wanted to add, by creating more access to health care, we create stronger safety net for any types of epidemic diseases. Think about it. If people did not have to worry about money, they will go to doctor. Doctor will record the information, and eventually, data will be all there to allow experts see what is spreading, and come up with possible defenses. Or heck, identify some problem that might not be apparent to the city like decline in water treatment capability, or some other issues. More data leads to better policy decisions, and perhaps help people pinpoint some of problematic chemicals, for instance.

Just think about the possibilities.

[Phoebe]

I agree with the desired outcome, but at least to play devil's advocate here: if it's a right, why does anyone have to pay? Does this automatically imply single payer govt system for all? And then, how much access is a right? What level of reasons have to be met before this right of access can be restricted?

[FlameBlade]

[Mike]

[Phoebe]

Can't we do all of that without treating it as a "right"? One obvious advantage is, if it's NOT a right, rich people can go ahead and pay what they can afford to on it.

We know health itself can't possibly be a right, so the right would be access to care. To define that isn't a simple matter of drawing lines or distinguishing levels. We'd have to say things like, if you can't use the restroom by yourself, you have a right to have someone help you do it, so the government needs to find and pay you a helper. But if it's just that you have trouble using the restroom by yourself or can't walk easily, your "rights" haven't yet kicked in. BTW this is dead serious, don't let the restroom part make it seem jokey.

[FlameBlade]

I mean. Who gets to decide all the rules? What are the tradeoffs?

[FlameBlade]

Seriously, I think that many questions are best left to experts, 99 percent independent from legislators, allowing data to come in, and determine what is working and what isn't to figure out the best return on investment. As it stands, having a good health care in general that will be than enough for serving 95 percent of the population. Where to cut off access for what becomes very hairy very quickly. Especially when it comes to few fields.

By asking a lot of questions about access, then suddenly, health care might be serving 50 percent or 35 percent. See women's health as an example.

[Phoebe]

I agree with you; and the less abstract it is, the better we're going to grasp what people are actually dealing with, and how their financial access directly determines quality of life.

[Mike]

And I'm not worried much about whether we call it a right or not. Rights are only what are agreed upon and granted by whoever's in charge. Rights can be modified, limited or taken away by the government.

Right now, our law guarantees that everyone has access to healthcare, in that a person in need can't be turned away. Does that make it a Right? Whether it is or isn't, what need is it serving and is it very effective at It? Beats me. So does a right to access mean the government has to pay for It? Does a right to affordable healthcare mean the government has to pay for everything for everyone? Does a right to healthcare in general mean that?

I don't much care. We just need to do better.