Facts Of Health Care
The Government directed the Citizens Health Care working group to prepare a report to provide all Americans with a basic set of information to help start a national discussion on health care and give solid ideas and recommendations for creating a health care system. The Health Report to the American People can be found, the report is:
Key Facts about the Cost of Health Care in America:
1. All the citizens pay for health care through both private funds and public dollars. Either way, it comes out of our own pockets.
- Private spending is that is pay for health care, either through insurance or directly with our own money.
- Public spending for health care comes from tax, dollars that federal, state, and local governments use to pay for programs like Medicare and Medicaid.
- Government also helps to pay for health care through tax breaks for employees whose employers offer health benefits.
2. Costs are rising sharply.
- Back in 1960, we spent few dollars for the earning on health care in the United States. That was the same amount we spent on education. Now a day, the percent going to health care has tripled, while what we spend on education hasn’t even doubled.
- In 2004, America’s total health care bill came to $1.8 trillion. If you added up every dollar earned by every American worker in the first two months of the years, the total would be this amount.
- For each person, we spent about $6,400 on health care in 2004. In ten years, this amount is expected to rise to $11,000.
- Part of the cost of care is the money spent on medical research. It underpins significant advances in the care we receive. As a result, the U.S. is the leader in development of new technologies and remedies, especially drugs, which greatly improve our lives.
3. Higher costs can result in less coverage and less care.
- Higher health care costs mean insurers have to charge higher premiums.This makes employers less likely to offer coverage that employees can afford.
- In 2004, about one in 20 Americans reported that costs prevented them from obtaining needed care.
4. Our need for health care and spending varies a lot and changes over the course of our lives.
- In any given year, close to 50 percent of all health care spending pays for the care received by only 5 percent of the population.
- Health care for people with chronic diseases accounts for 75 percent of our total health care costs. Managing these illnesses can be expensive. For example, in 2002, people with diabetes spent, on average, $13,243 on health care bills.
- Other things, such as serious illnesses, accidents, or premature births, can be very expensive. Hospital charges alone can top $100,000 for these cases.
- Health care needs tend to increase over time. On average, only about one-fifth of all money that will ever be spend on our health care in for health care we use in the first half of our lives. But half of all the money spent on our health care will be for care we get after we turn age 65. On average, health care costs for people ages 76 to 84 are about $8,000 every year. This is almost eight times as much as for children between 1 and 5 years old.
5. Waste and inefficiency also contribute to higher costs.
- We pay for health care in a very complicated way. Complex billing and paperwork may result in relatively high administrative costs in the United States and can be frustrating for patients, hospitals, and insurance companies.
Key Facts about the Quality of Health Care in America:
- Despite all the money we spend, people often do not get the care they need. Overall, adults get only 55 percent of the recommended care for many common conditions.
- Despite spending more per person on health care than other developed countries, our results are not consistently better and are sometimes worse.
- For example, the United States has seen an increase in the death rate from asthma in recent years, while death rates for asthma have declined in Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand.
Filed under: Health | Tagged: Health Care, Medicaid, Medicare
