"Medicare for All" continues to be a hot issue, especially that Obama's man, Joe Biden, is now president. So far, the Democrats' debate focuses on the expansion of Medicare and how it would affect private health insurance and middle-class taxes. However, there is lack of substantive debate regarding the lower quality of health care and longer wait times that would be a result of this policy, a sentiment echoed by former President Donald Trump. “Medicare-for-All” would rob millions of seniors of their current benefits, restrict them from purchasing supplemental insurance, and put their lives at risk.
"Wait times" is a disputed point like everything else in the healthcare debate. Thomas Waldrop, a healthcare analyst, pointed, "Wait time concern amounts to little more than fear-mongering by those who oppose the expansion of coverage." We won't know for sure who's right, of course, unless we actually implement Medicare for All.
The Partnership for America's Health Care issued the statement reminding Americans that this one-size-fits-all system would force them to pay more to wait longer for worse care. President Biden has proposed a one-size-fits all system run by Washington, with all the same unaffordable costs and tax hikes, loss of patient choice, and higher wait time. We can all agree that every U.S citizen deserves access to high-quality care, but these proposals are the wrong way to achieve that goal.
The Congressional Budget Office(CBO) also cautioned that "patients might face increased wait times and reduced access to care under Medicare for All." Such a system "could also reduce the quality of care," while "the number of hospitals and other health care facilities might also decline as a result of closures, and there might be less investment in new and existing facilities."
If I am effectively going to be paying the same amount for my health care (be it in insurance premiums or taxes), why should I settle for a reduced quality of care and a longer wait to receive that care. Medicare-for-all amounts to poor healthcare for all, so everyone shares in the misery.
