Frontline documentary highlights health care crisis

Senator Max Baucus (D-Mont.) doesn’t think it’s a good idea to channel surf through the television to find a solution to America’s healthcare crisis but for the Senate’s Finance Chairman who was doing just that, it helped in this mornings “Lessons from International Health Systems” forum.

Baucus hosted the forum and was joined along side by by Frontline corespondent and Washington Post Bureau Chief T.R. Reid. Reid was the principle anchor of the newly released documentary titled “Sick Around the World” which takes a look at five countries outside os America’s healthcare systems. England, Germany, Japan, Switzerland and Taiwan were all profiled in Reid’s documentary which was highlighted at the Finance Committees hearing.

According to Reid all five countries profiled feature unique qualities that should seriously be considered for adoption by the United States. While many American’s according to Reid believe that European and Asian countries have socialized medicine Reid maintains they don’t. Reid and Baucus believe that changing the healthcare system in America is an uphill battle; they also agree that it’s a a moral issue. “People must understand that designing a healthcare system is a moral question, it’s a question of moral values,” said Reid.

Frightening statistics that Reid cited was that 20,000 American’s die every year simply because they do not have heath care. Reid believes that the first thing we need to do to fix the American health care system is “you have to have universal coverage.” Reid added “you cover everybody first and then you get the political buy in to make the tough decisions.”

While each country can be vastly different from the United States system. Reid believes that it is Japan that is most closely related to the United States. “Japan is much closer to the United States, it’s private doctors, private hospitals, it’s not single payer, it’s many private insurance plans, great care, fabulous health results and half the cost per capita that we spend.”


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click to watch "Sick Around the World" online