Why the Affordable Health Care Act is Unlikely to Benefit Your Health

December 22, 2012

Story at-a-glance

Guaranteed health insurance does NOT equate to guaranteed health care. No strategies are included in the Affordable Health Care Act to actually prevent illness and reduce health care costs. Instead it expands an already flawed model of “care” that has been and continues to be one of the leading causes of death in the US
A recent review of U.S. healthcare expenses revealed that 30 cents of every dollar spent on medical care is wasted, adding up to $750 billion annually. This is the system being expanded upon with the Affordable Health Care Act
The US spends twice as much per person on health care than any other nation, yet we rank 49th in terms of life expectancy, and despite giving newborn babies more vaccines than any other country on the planet, the US ranks 30th for infant mortality
There is massive collusion going on between federal regulatory agencies and the industries they’re supposed to regulate, which ensures not just the profitability of Big Pharma and the medical industry as a whole, but also Big Ag, which is another major culprit behind the nation’s poor health. The ultimate price for this collusion and undermining of truth is your health. It’s a for-profit scheme, and healthy people do not make good customers

By Dr. Mercola

There can be little doubt that we're in a health care crisis of massive proportions. The Affordable Health Care Act is the proposed solution, but to any person aware of the facts, it should be evident that so-called "ObamaCare" is NOT a viable solution.

Now that President Obama has won a second term, it is clear that the Affordable Care Act will be implemented in full force.

When this act was initially introduced, I described it as a mandatory tax despite the fact this was widely denied. Now it is widely accepted that the Affordable Health Care Act is indeed a mandatory insurance tax.

More importantly though, guaranteed health insurance does NOT equate to guaranteed health care. First of all, one of the key factors is access to health care providers, which is sorely lacking already.

Secondly, the Act will promote rather than solve the current problem of wasteful spending. If you didn't already know this, American medical care is the most expensive in the world. The U.S. spends more than twice as much on each person for health care as most other industrialized countries.

No strategies are included in the Act to actually prevent illness and reduce health care costs. Instead it expands an already flawed model of "care" that has been and continues to be one of the leading causes of death in the US!

$750 Billion Wasted Each Year

A recent review of U.S. healthcare expenses by the Institutes of Medicine¹ revealed that 30 cents of every dollar spent on medical care is wasted, adding up to $750 billion annually. To get an understanding of how much money three-quarters of a trillion dollars really is, take a look at the video below.

If you think it's bad now, just wait until the Affordable Health Care Act gets implemented. There's nothing to prevent the wastefulness already inherent in the current Medicare and Medicaid system. Six major areas of waste identified in the report were:

Unnecessary services: $210 billion	Inflated prices: $105 billion
Inefficient delivery of care: $130 billion	Improper payments: $70 billion
Excess administrative costs: $190 billion	Fraud: $75 billion

The United States spends $2.7 trillion annually — again, TWICE the amount per person as most other industrialized nations. If this spending actually resulted in Americans being among the healthiest people on the planet, I'd be all for it. After all, what is money if you don't have your health?

Unfortunately, that isn't the case. Using life expectancy as a barometer for the return of our investment, shows us that this expenditure is entirely in vain as the US life expectancy ranks 49th in the world, despite the fact that we're spending more on our health care than any nation on the planet.

The United States also gives newborn babies more vaccines than any other nation, yet as vaccination rates have risen, so has our infant mortality rates. In 1960, America ranked 12th in infant mortality among all nations of the world. By 2005, we had fallen to number 30. Today in America, there are more premature babies than ever before and more full term babies die before their first birthday than in most European countries. Is it possible that more is NOT better when it comes to inoculating our young against disease?