I'm not Sure it's Enough

Let me try to convey how incredibly comforting it is to receive a health care card in the mail. One for you, one for your husband and one for your child. A card that costs nothing. Health care could be the single reason we don't come back to the States. I struggle with the idea constantly. Thank you Obama for fighting for health care reform. It's blasphemous that we've allowed the system to continue out of control for so long. But I'm afraid it's not enough.

If you are like the millions of Americans who are afraid of "socialized medicine" let me put your fears at ease. It's possible to have both a public option and a private option. Don't want to wait? Go to a private doctor. Period. What is there to be afraid of? Here in Italy, you only pay for the visit at the private doctor. And the costs aren't inflated; it's expensive, but it's feasible. And there are no other fees, nothing to pay per month, just the cost of the visit.

If you think about our system, or you try to explain it to foreigners, it is really ridiculous; and embarrassing. Basically, we or our employers pay a monthly fee to an insurance company; no less than $100 a month. Then you go to the doctor and you pay a co-pay for the visit, anywhere from 10 to 40 dollars. After the visit you get a bill from the doctor. Usually you have to pay some percentage for tests or x-rays, prescriptions, etc. Remind me, why do we pay the monthly fee? It's really hard to explain to people who have their health care paid for by their government. Which, let me remind you, is the case in every "first world" country outside of America. People in the world expect it. Americans have been convinced they don't need it so that the people who make all of the money off of our ignorance, can keep making money.

Obama had to fight for reform but he still didn't get the public option passed. Which means people still have to pay, a lot, for insurance for themselves and their families. The changes he's made: the inability for insurance companies to deny people with pre-existing conditions, the ability for young adults to stay on their parent's insurance longer; I wouldn't really call it reform, it's more like tightening the belt. But I am happy things are changing. I just hope it will start the momentum to actually create public health care in the U.S.

In Italy, everyone can receive health care. Even if you are poor, even if you are an immigrant; you will not be denied health care, on any level. Just think, immigrants with the swine flu don't wander the streets getting everyone sick. They get well and they don't spread epidemics. Go to the doctor and get yourself better. You are indeed a human being above all. In my experience, and from talking with people, the care at the public hospitals and the private care is the same. Just because doctors work in the public hospital doesn't mean that they don't work just as hard as the doctors in the private ones. Doctors care about people, not about money. And they still make a really good living in both cases.

So what is the problem? What are people afraid of? Higher taxes? If only my tax money went to health care instead of the military. If we didn't spend billions everyday in the wars, we could take care of the people who have hundreds in debt because of health care, retirees who can't retire because they have to pay for their prescriptions and the children who are dying because the parents can't pay for their needed surgeries.

If you're not on board, you're not a compassionate human being. It's not complicated.