The Healing of America: A Global Quest for Better, Cheaper, and Fairer Health Care

This is a book that every American, especially all politicians at every level--national, state, and local--should read. T R Reid compares health systems of many of the advanced countries of the world and shows how and why the US falls short of countries like France, Japan, the UK, and Canada in terms of percentage of citizens covered by insurance and how efficiently healthcare is delivered. In the process, he debunks many misconceptions that Americans have about the choices citizens of other countries have in their healthcare and which ones practice the dreaded "socialized medicine." For the US to catch up to the world's leaders in efficiently delivered quality healthcare for all its citizens, Reid asserts that the US must first arrive a national consensus that there is a moral imperative to do so. He cites the example of Taiwan as a country with a well-developed capitalistic economy that in the 1990s made that national commitment and implemented the changes necessary in its healthcare structure to satisfy that commitment.

I hasten to add that Reid conducts his discussion of this most important of topics in a wonderfully clear and engaging way and amply documents the research that led him to his conclusions.

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An excellent and interesting primer on health care policy, May 09, 2017
By EclecticGML

This book opened my eyes to the range of policies and possibilities used by countries with the world's best health care systems. Spoiler alert: the United States has a lot to learn.

In my judgment, if more people read this book, it will elevate discussion of health care policy in the United States. Instead of focusing on political ideology, T.R. Reid's analysis encourages one to consider outcomes as the measuring stick for the effectiveness of a nation's health care system. These are some of the statistics, relayed by Reid, that stood out most to me:

--The number of people who die from curable illness is almost twice as high in the US as in France, Japan, and Spain.

--Americans with diabetes die younger than in any of the other countries in a study conducted by the Commonwealth Fund.

--We tied for last in a twenty-three-country study on healthy life expectancy at age sixty.

--And “out of twenty-three wealthy countries, the American health care system ranks dead last when it comes to keeping newborns alive. Our infant mortality rate is more than twice as high as the rate in the top-ranked countries, Sweden and Japan.”

Fortunately, T.R. Reid's point is that there are excellent, successful health care models from around the world that we can learn from, if we are willing to step outside of our American-exceptionalism-related biases.

I truly hope that more people read this book because lives are on the line.

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Want Better Health Care in the US? Just Look Overseas, April 29, 2017
By Dick_Burkhart

This wonderful little book vividly describes what the mainstream media has been hiding from the American people – exactly why other developed countries have both better overall health and far cheaper health care systems than the US. Using a personal quest to fix his sore shoulder, renowned reporter Reid shows how health care actually works in France, Germany, Japan, England, Canada, India, and more. Each system is different, yet they all work better than in the US because they provide universal coverage and eliminate the profit motive. Ironically, the US provides examples of all types health care systems. Medicare is a single payer system (Canada), the VA system is government run (England), employer coverage is the Bismarck model (Germany and Japan), and millions pay out-of-pocket (India).

The details really matter, but the final results are very similar, given a common moral basis: health care is a human right. In France, everyone has a smart card that contains their entire medical history. No clerical staff needed. In the UK, all care is free (the most loved system in the world – all paid for by taxes), and doctors have strong incentives to keep people healthy. Japan severely limits costs by government mandate but has thousands of private, non-profit insurance plans, which must accept all applicants and pay every bill. France and Japan have strictly limited co-pays, except none for the needy. In Germany unemployment benefits include automatic health care. The rich may opt out.

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Read before repealing, replacing or enhancing the ACA, March 27, 2017
By A Customer

Should be required reading for anyone talking repeal, replace, or enhancing the ACA. Learn the facts about how our expensive healthcare system stacks up against others world wide. You will come away with facts to shape your own opinion about if healthcare should be an American right?, Do doctors make too much money in the US?, Are pharmaceutical companies the problem or the solution? Are insurance companies the key to reigning in costs? It's an easy read but it's filled with facts that can help you decide on one of the most important issues facing America... what should our healthcare system look like moving forward

6 of 6 people found the above review helpful.

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THE MORAL ISSUE, January 16, 2017
By Kindle Customer

Wow, what an eye opener. I always thought that to ensure health care for everyone the United States would have to resort to increased spending and socialism. However, this book debunked that myth. In fact, a universal health care system, whether it is the Beveridge Model or the Bismark Model, can save money and ensure health care for everyone. But most importantly, a nation that provides universal health care demonstrates good morals and values.

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Reid is a journalist who has an excellent writing style, June 13, 2016
By S. Freeman

A superb book. T.R. Reid is a journalist who has an excellent writing style. He identifies and examines all of the various types of health care systems in the world--Single Payer, which we are hearing so much about today and which our Medicare system is; the Bismarck Model of private (NON PROFIT) insurance companies; the Beveridge model, which is actual "socialized" medicine; the U.S. model, which actually is a dysfunctional conglomeration of the 3 previous models PLUS, the primary private for profit system that delivers substandard health care to a majority of the population.

As numerous studies have shown, even with "Obamacare", the U.S. has the least effective health care system in the developed world, with even some developing nations providing superior care to their populations than the current system provides citizens of the U.S. Though written before Obamacare, a careful reading of the book will tell readers, while an improvement over what we had, Obama care ultimately will not work, and will have to be restructured into one of the existing 3 national health care systems. While my personal preference probably is single payer, I think it would be easier to get citizens to accept the Bismarck model of NON PROFIT private insurance companies. While it will surprise people indoctrinated in the myth of the magic of the "free market", non profit insurance companies are very competitive; there actually are more health insurance companies per capita in Germany than in the U.S. France, which uses the Bismarck health care system generally is regarded as having the best health care system in the world. Germany's health care system, of course, is among the best too. Even though we have single payer Medicare, I think the Bismarck system would be an easier sell to people who have fallen prey to the Republicans' disingenuous arguments about national health care and "socialized" medicine.

Anyone truly interested in the nation's health care should read Reid's book, because it will be a genuine education on the various approaches to health care throughout the world.

53 of 53 people found the above review helpful.

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