Health Care Reform, Franco-American Style

Roger Cohen has a sober, informed look at the differences and similarities between the US health care system and, the horror, the French system. We're not so different, except in a few ways. Chief of which:

I don’t think there’s much to debate when France spends 11 percent of its gross domestic product on health care and insures everyone and the United States spends 16.5 percent of G.D.P. and leaves 20 percent of adults under 65 uninsured. The numbers don’t lie: The U.S. system is wasteful and unjust.

We could learn a bit from actually looking at their system. We share some principles, like a combination of private and public funding, but we differ in efficiency (and humanity, but that's another topic).

If the hysteria could just go away, and the people of this country stop and think about this, there's really no reason to be upset. But as long as the fearmongers work their magic on the gullible and not-so-smart masses that make up their daily audiences, we're doomed and will end up with a watered-down and ineffective bandaging of our current system. And in that scenario, we all lose.