Who gets health care?

As a society we need to step back, take a long look, and decide what health care we want for our citizens. If all we want is for those who can afford it to have it, problem solved! We do nothing except stop reimbursing hospital emergency rooms for services they render without being paid.

If, on the other hand, we want all citizens to have a minimum level of care and we want the private free market to provide it, then everyone must have a private insurance policy. If the premiums are to be affordable, everyone, and I mean every person, healthy or sick, must buy a policy. The only way to do that is to have incentives to buy a policy and/or penalties for not buying.

That, however, seems to be the major complaint to the current Affordable Care Act. Speaker Paul Ryan proudly displayed a pie chart that illustrated how unfair it was that the insurance premiums of so many healthy people were subsidizing the health care for a small number of sick people. Does Speaker Ryan not understand that his chart was a perfect description of how any private insurance program works?

So, it seems like we are looking for a new and wonderful system that our best minds have, for years, been unsuccessful in finding. An idea: Medicare is working for millions of our citizens right now. Why not Medicare for all? Yes, taxes will have to go up to pay for it, but I trust our Congress to figure out a way to put lipstick on that pig. They do it so well for the things they want. RICHARD L. PICARD Little Rock