Re: Who the Health Cares?

Read the Original Post: https://advocatepressonline.wixsite.com/blog/single-post/2017/04/19/Who-the-Health-Cares

healthcare

I am writing in reply to the article, “who the health cares” published by The Advocate Press previously. The entire presumption by the Author is that healthcare is a privilege—and not a right—in the American scheme.

First, on the definition of healthcare, I do agree with the author that healthcare, as it is understood in American Society, is indeed focused on the work of doctors and caregivers. This is, as the author suggests, the practice of “medicine.”

I do not agree, however, with the author’s use of the term “right.” Dictionary definitions are good at providing contemporary usages for words. However, they only provide one frame of reference. American society, in contrast, is more than just a dictionary. It operates within contexts. What is considered a privilege at one time may be fundamental again later. While the Supreme Court has often looked to those ideas “steeped in the nation’s history” to find what is definitively a fundamental right, what society views as “rights” change over time. The founders of the nation probably never considered the idea of interracial marriage to be a fundamental “right.” Nor would they have seen a “right” to travel abroad. In fact, the founds talked greatly of freedom while holding sacrosanct the ancient institution of slavery. Yet, we see the rights of marriage, freedom, movement, and autonomy today.

And I believe that these ideas are embodied within the context of the founder’s own words, that people “are endowed . . . with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

Healthcare (medicine, if you will) is a part of that pursuit of happiness. When we look to happiness, it should not be exercised only by the individual, but also in the context of a better society. The preservation of human life, the long-term sustainability of our society, and the need for all of us to take care of one another far outweighs any other person’s notion of individual rights. Medicine should not be exclusive to those who afford it, it should be given freely, without restraint, in efforts to heal all and increase the overall happiness of society. Indeed, we can accomplish far more together than we could separate. Moreover, united we stand and divided we fall. Words like these were never more relevant and applicable.

Therefore, healthcare is a right: one that we exercise in our pursuit of happiness. The only way it is a privilege is when another citizen tries to restrain the right of another to have access and use of such a wonderful system. Together, we conquered Polio. No individual did this; it was the product of a society that saw the benefit of working together rather than leaving everyone to fend for themselves. Let’s apply this concept of cooperation to make medicine accessible to all and to end suffering of all kinds throughout our nation. Let us make it so that people don’t have to choose between bankruptcy and medicine. Let society bare the risk of human frailness, not the individual citizen.

Is healthcare a right? Indeed, it is when viewed in the context of societal happiness. It is only a privilege when viewed in the political arena.