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In reply to the discussion: Dem lawmakers call for single-payer healthcare [View all]ehrnst
(32,640 posts)acknowledge that there are many ways that Europe has gotten universal health care coverage, the majority being multiple payers.
Sensible elected Democrats who dare to talk about the obstacles that are not being talked about will be vilified as shills, instead of knowing what health policy analysts do. Most developed countries use multi-payer mechanisms.
People should not equate "universal health care" with single payer, and that is what is happening. Single payer is one way, and it's expensive, and will be much more disruptive to implement.
Even Medicare isn't single payer, and is much, much less comprehensive than what "medicare for all" has been touted.
And, no, I don't work for "big pharma" or "big hospital" or "big doctor."
I'm saying that single payer as they describe will take at least 20 years to implement. Canada took longer than that. Canada only went federal with single payer after all the provinces did it independently of each other. With single payer failing in Vermont, and Coloradocare being soundly defeated last November, it's not looking good for the US to take the route they did.
We can't even keep the ACA for 10 years without it being chipped away at.
Here is a good overview of the subject from a premier self-funded, non-partisan health policy think tank:
http://khn.org/news/democrats-unite-but-what-happened-to-medicare-for-all/
(No, it is not connected with Kaiser Permanente. They are both named after the same person.)
I lived in England and loved the care I had there, and wondered for a very long time why we wouldn't do it here. I understand now, and think that it's dangerous to make "single payer or bust" party dogma. Universal health care, yes. But not limiting it to one, seldom-implemented method.