Health care summit at White House a first step to overhaul

Proposing “Universal Healthcare”

President Obama will kick off his effort to try to overhaul the nation's troubled health care system again today with an important misnomer.

There is an almost mystical number that that everyone - politicians, media, etc,. use for the so-called "uninsured" : 47mn. However, what no one will talk about - except the US Census Deptartment, is that many of the uninsured are not even Americans* . The way the media and politicians speak about this subject is often coded. They say "47mn people in this country (not 47mln Americans) don't have health insurance." Perhaps the reason is that no politician wants to have to discuss providing health insurance to millions of illegal aliens.


Now should the society decide to make the necessary expenditures to cover thousands of illegal aliens is another question -as well as forcing young adults to have healthcare insurance, but a question that should be asked honestly and debated in a transparent manner and not obfuscated the way it is now.







According to the US Census Department*:

Uninsured people in the USA who are NOT U.S. CITIZENS IS 45% or 10.2mln of the 47mln (22%)
Broken down by age, 18 - 34 years old 56.2% (19mln or 40% of the 47mln)do not have health insurance.



It's not such a "crisis" as the media makes it out to be: So in other words, fully 62% of the total uninsured are either non-Americans are young adults.

Of the remaining 35mln a good portion (19mln) are young people between the ages of 18 and 34 who, given free choice, have under their own cost/benefit analysis decided that paying a $1k p/month for health insurance they will most likely not need is not worth the costs.

All children, by the way, that don't have parental coverage, are covered by Medicaid. There is also State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP).



* http://www.census.gov/prod/2007pubs/p60-233.pdf