Health Care Reform Debate

On Nov. 7, the House of Representatives passed the much awaited Health Care Bill. Political Science professors Peter Matthews and Gloria Sadal, along with Economics professor Parwinder Sidhu, had a second debate on the Health Care Reform, which took place in HUM 131 2 p.m.  

Mathews started the debate by arguing that the Declaration of Independence guarantees the people the "Right to life … and the pursuit of happiness." While it is clear how the ‘Right to life' part of it fits into his argument, he further explained that a person would not be able to pursue happiness without their health. Mathews gave examples of countries like Canada and Britain changed into universal health care to guarantee their people freedom and well-being. Mathews also added to his argument by saying that he dose not agree with the weakened version of the Bill that Congress passed but he believes that it is a step towards a single payer option, which to Matthews is the ideal.

Professor Gloria Badal argued that the notion if the United States passes a health care reform we will lose our edge economically and become a socialist country and that we will become in fact more competitive if we pass the reform. Badal proves her point by citing statistics showing that the United States spends exponentially more on health care than every other country and that by doing so, it looses a lot of business when companies that come here are forced to pay exorbitant rates for their employees' health care. Another point Badal made was that even though Americans are dubious of the new bill because they do not know the advantages to free health care first hand, once they have a taste for it they will not let go and will even insist on universal health care.

As for Sidhu, even though she is for the health care reform, she expresses her concern for the cost of this reform. She points out that even the President admits that the government dose not have enough money to make the transition yet, but he believes passing the bill is a crucial step in that direction. Sidhu points out that the bill will cost 1 trillion dollars over the next ten years and that the President expects to get that money mostly from cutbacks and new provisions. However, this will only cover about 10 percent of the costs.

Sidhu also looked at the bill from an economics perspective and how it will affect the people who presently can not afford to be sick, by setting caps on how much people will have to pay out of pocket among other precautions.

Students were then allowed to ask questions, and many did. And even while Mathews answered about Canada's health care system saying that rumors about long lines were not true, one student pointed out that her uncle, who lives in Canada, had to wait 12 years for a heart surgery, to which Badal rebutted that anecdotal proof is not enough and that when you look at hard statistics, their health care system is better than ours just by life expectancy alone. Many of the questions ended up pointing out that the other systems are better because they provide preventive care.