Universal healthcare solves the problem. The US is #1 in science and tech, but spends the most with worse outcomes in general healthcare than other peer countries by far.
Why would it be any different here?
Hospital bills causing bankruptcy.
Deciding between meds or food.
Donation jars at gas station checkouts begging for money to pay for a child's cancer treatment.
Putting off preventative care because of endless co-pays.
Out-of-network providers being a thing I have to worry.
Those problems I do know.
The US is #1 in developed countries for infant and maternal mortality.
Americans die from preventable and treatable causes at much higher rates than residents of peer countries, alongside a life expectancy of 79, or two to four years lower than the average for OECD countries.
We spend 18% of our GDP on healthcare, NEARLY DOUBLE the average of other peer countries.
The number one cause of bankruptcy is medical debt.
When will the American people wake up and realize their private healthcare model only benefits the rich that are able to afford the care.
This is only because the United States is unique in its huge amount of preterm babies, which some other developed countries do not even count within their infant mortality statistics. If we had the same average infant gestation length as Sweden, we would be tied for fourth best with France and Portugal, which considering how obese we are is pretty impressive. If we had that and adopted more restrictive reporting categories like Poland or the Netherlands, we could very well be reporting as the lowest.
Medical debt is not the number one cause of bankruptcy so you're simply wrong there. Most consumers who file for bankruptcy have some medical debt but the most common cause is a sudden loss of income (like losing their job). When consumers don't have enough cash to make ends meet they prioritize paying for food, housing, and transportation, and stop paying medical bills. Thus the medical debts tend to accumulate but this didn't really cause the bankruptcy.
I do support measures to reduce healthcare costs and improve access for patients but let's be clear about what's actually happening.
Lose your job from injury and you're well and truly screwed.
The US system is neither fully private nor are those other systems fully public. Its a false binary people use so they don't have to actually engage in the details of how different systems operate.
Nobody is arguing that the US has a good or 'the right' system. And nobody should argue that the British NHS (or systems like it) is some amazing magical place that gets everything right.
> When will the American people wake up and realize their private healthcare model only benefits the rich that are able to afford the care.
And yet one of the countries wit the lowest spending % of GDP on healthcare with very good outcomes has a system that has a lot of private aspects.
The US is #3 in the world for it spending on healthcare as a percentage of it's GDP, actually 16.69% in 2023, right behind Tuvalu and Nauru.
Maybe do some research before you state absurdly wrong things
Not vast. About 55% (workers and the family members) are covered by employer-sponsored health insurance. And that mostly self-selects for the younger and healthier so the coverage is less for random person.
Most retired people are not covered, and ironically very often the sick are not covered.
> absurdly wrong
I think you need to research the HN guidelines a bit more: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html