I've devoted the last several weeks to Bible study, prayer and meditation about health care reform, and I've come to the conclusion that the only Christian option is to support universal health care by a single-payer system.  I know I'm probably going to get some angry responses, but please bear with me here.

As Christians, we should take care of everyone who needs care - no matter what their lifestyle is (even if they are couch potatoes - we still need to love them), no matter what their immigration status is.  As Christians (not as Americans), why would we not care for everyone?  As Christians - why would we care about how much money it costs?

As an American - I was looking at the financial statements for some health insurance companies.  Half of their expenses are health care costs to doctors, hospitals, pharmacies, etc.  The other half is administrative and profits.  If we got rid of health insurance completely, our health care costs could be cut by at least a third (considering that some costs are now paid by government).  We don't get rid of them because many of us invest in them because they make a nice profit for us.  That's not Christian - that's capitalism.

What if doctors were just federal employees paid salaries - not on a per diem?  Then they could spend as much time as necessary to take care of each patient, and do what each patient needs, instead of being held hostage by health insurance companies? read more »

I asked for Christians to come up with a better plan a couple of weeks ago, but got no response.  Why?

I have some ideas:

- Allow for a high risk pool, like we have for auto insurance, so people with pre-existing conditions can get insurance.

- Allow health insurance companies to sell across state lines.  This would allow people to choose their plans and by having a larger group to sell to, would decrease premiums.

- If they don't want to do a high risk pool, why not allow people who have been denied insurance three or more times to be able to BUY INTO the current plans government employees have now.

- Prevent insurance companies from denying or non-renewing coverage to small businesses when an employee gets sick.

These options wouldn't break the bank, and would solve many of the problems we have now. read more »

As a Christian, I have a problem opposing national health care. Why can't we take care of our sick who are in need?

Right now, doctors are beholden to profit-making corporations, and instead of a bureaucrat between you and your doctor, an employee of a profit-making corporation is making decisions that will determine how much money the corporation profits. That sounds immoral to me.

If you don't have health insurance, doctors just won't take you. My son is dealing with that now - he is too old for our health insurance and although he worked full-time for the required time, the week before he was to get benefits, they put an indefinate freeze on new benefits.  Someone will have to quit or get fired for him to qualify, and nobody there dares to quit in this econonmy. He needs an MRI, and has the $1800 for it, but can't find a doctor to prescribe it - the hospitals won't do one without a prescription. Clinics won't do it because his situation is too complicated.  read more »

As a Christian, I have a problem opposing national health care. Why can't we take care of our sick who are in need? What would Jesus do?

Right now, doctors are beholden to profit-making corporations, and instead of a bureaucrat between you and your doctor, an employee of a profit-making corporation is making decisions that will determine how much money the corporation profits. That sounds immoral to me.

Here in the US, if you want to see a specialist, you have to see your primary care physician first (and you sometimes wait weeks for an appointment), and if they think you need to see the specialist, they write you a referral, which goes to the profit-making corporation to decide whether or not they will cover it - and that can take weeks, or even years if they decide not to cover it right away. Then you make the appointment to see the specialist, and the wait there can be weeks. read more »