Health care solution could eliminate insurers

Michael Mayo’s column “After Obamacare Ruling, Dissent from Past Supporter,” illustrates the deficiencies in the Affordable Care Act.

His last sentence, however, points to the solution — if we simply create a Medicare-for-all plan, it could replace the more than 1,300 insurance companies (with their profitdriven motives to deny care while increasing premiums and their $400 billion in overhead costs) with a single, national health-insurance plan administered by Medicare and offering expanded coverage and benefits. And it would be a better alternative to the Affordable Care Act.

For all those who would characterize a single-payer Medicare-for-all program as socialistic, they are mistaken. Single-payer is not a socialist system. Under socialized medicine, hospitals are owned by the government, and doctors are salaried public employees. For example, the U.S. Veterans Affairs Department and U.S. Department of Defense have a socialized system, as do Great Britain and Cuba.

Under single-payer “Universal Medicare,” everyone would have free choice of doctors and hospitals, with no co-pays. The doctors and hospitals would simply send the bill to a single national insurance entity for payment, rather than to the 1,300 insurance companies.

True Medicare for all would mean the same coverage for everyone. In addition, Medicaid would no be longer needed. Hundreds of billions of dollars in administrative costs would be saved, which would cover the cost of insuring the now-uninsured.

Frederick Ford, North Palm Beach