Medicare for All

Thanks to Eugene Weekly for printing Peter Holden’s letter about the scandalous cost of health care (Dec. 27). I had a similar experience when my aged mother was billed $185,000 for a week in the hospital and a hip replacement. Medicare paid almost all of it, but we should consider how our tax dollars are getting ripped off.

Already in advance of the 2020 elections, Medicare for Allquite possibly a plank in the Democratic Party agenda, is getting push-back propaganda from Wall Street. Their estimates in tens of trillions are based on current prices and costs in our broken system.

A fair estimate should deduct the cost of extortionary private insurance, and the scandalous costs of provider care and administration, that otherwise could be negotiated to a more reasonable level. And how about no more $2,000-a-day hospital rooms and expensive TV drug commercials?

Assuming Medicare policy would want a cost-effective, healthier American population, preventative medicine would most likely become more the universal standard and would continue to drive down cost.

With profit not being a goal in a government administrated system, plus all Americans contributing an affordable health care premium, the cost of Medicare for All would be doable and not break any budgets.

Most of all, we could achieve a healthier nation, which we don’t have now.

It’s time we caught up with the rest of the advanced world and put an end to the injustice of unaffordable health care.

Russ Desaulnier