Beyond the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Urgent Need to Expand Primary Care and Family Medicine.
Fam Med
; 53(1): 48-53, 2021 01.
Article
in English
| MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-1038806
ABSTRACT
The COVID-19 pandemic, together with its resultant economic downturn, has unmasked serious problems of access, costs, quality of care, inequities, and disparities of US health care. It has exposed a serious primary care shortage, the unreliability of employer-sponsored health insurance, systemic racism, and other dysfunctions of a system turned on its head without a primary care base. Fundamental reform is urgently needed to bring affordable health care that is accessible to all Americans. Over the last 40-plus years, our supposed system has been taken over by corporate stakeholders with the presumption that a competitive unfettered marketplace will achieve the needed goal of affordable, accessible care. That theory has been thoroughly disproven by experience as the ranks of more than 30 million uninsured and 87 million underinsured demonstrates. Three main reform alternatives before us are (1) to build on the Affordable Care Act; (2) to implement some kind of a public option; and (3) to enact single-payer Medicare for All. It is only the third option that can make affordable, comprehensive health care accessible for our entire population. As the debate goes forward over these alternatives during this election season, the likelihood of major change through a new system of national health insurance is becoming increasingly realistic. Rebuilding primary care and public health is a high priority as we face a new normal in US health care that places the public interest above that of corporate stakeholders and Wall Street investors. Primary care, and especially family medicine, should become the foundation of a reformed health care system.
Full text:
Available
Collection:
International databases
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Primary Health Care
/
Quality of Health Care
/
Health Care Reform
/
Universal Health Insurance
/
Health Care Sector
/
Healthcare Disparities
/
Family Practice
/
COVID-19
Limits:
Humans
Country/Region as subject:
North America
Language:
English
Journal:
Fam Med
Year:
2021
Document Type:
Article
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