Is Health Care a Right or a Privilege?
It’s easy to ask, “Is Health Care a Right or a Privilege,” but to answer the question we must dig deep into our souls and understand the plight of others.
I like to think I’m a compassionate person, able to empathize with others born into the wrong family or environment, and even those who just didn’t get as many breaks in life that I did, but it’s not always easy.
I also think sometimes about what it must be like for those living a life of privilege. That’s why the video featured here had such an impact on me, and I hope on you too. It directly relates to our political debates over healthcare and other social issues too.
What is PRIVILEGE?
Defining the word is difficult, because it may depend on your position in life or the office you hold. Career politicians and the uber-wealthy may define Privilege as an advantage, liberty or benefit that’s rightfully bestowed upon them but not those beneath them.
Using Privilege in a sentence may help, so here are some examples:
- He lived a life of wealth and privilege.
- I had the privilege of knowing your grandfather.
- We had the privilege of being invited to the party.
- Good health care should be a right and not a privilege.
How does one earn privilege? Can they? Must they? Adam Donye created the exercise in this video to help a group of young adults understand the privileges that gave some of them a head start in life while leaving others behind. They can all compete, but just not on a level playing field. That’s like big corporations who used special interest lobbying power to steer laws and regulations in their favor for competitive advantage.
In the case of the healthcare industry, privilege can also determine who gets medical treatment, who is selected to get an organ transplant, and even who lives and dies. Is that right? Or should healthcare be a right? Think about that as you watch.
Examples of Privilege from the video:
- Both parents still married
- Growing up with a father figure in the home
- Had access to a private education
- Had access to a free tutor growing up
- Never had to worry about cellphone being shut off
- Never had to help mom and dad with the bills
- College was provided without an athletic scholarship
- Never wondered where next meal would come from
Note that none of those privileges had anything to do with what was done to earn them, but they still gave some people an advantage and more opportunities.
Life’s not fair, but it can certainly be made fairer if we look at Privilege differently. What do you think?
The Secret to Success
Related Videos on Privilege
- What is Privilege? (4:00 min YouTube with similar exercise and many other privileges)
- The Privilege Quiz (5:28 min YouTube video with fun questions by a geeky host)
- About those needing a little help (short Facebook video with powerful message)
- The power of privilege: Tiffany Jana’s 15 min TED Talk
- How Studying Privilege Systems Can Strengthen Compassion: Peggy McIntosh’s 18 min TED Talk
“An anthropologist invited children from an African tribe to play a game. He placed a bowl filled with sweet fruit by a tree. He addressed the children saying: ‘The one who gets to the tree first will be rewarded with all of the sweet fruits.’ When he signaled the children to start the race, they locked their hands together and ran toward the tree. They sat down at the tree together and shared the fruit. The astonished anthropologist asked the children why they had run together when each one of them had the opportunity to have all of the fruit for themselves. The children replied ‘Ubuntu.’ Is it possible for one to be happy when everyone else is sad? Ubuntu means: ‘I exist because we exist.'”
(story shared by Lucy Dinner)
Contrast this story with the PRIVILEGE exercise above it.
RELATED ARTICLES:
A Nation’s Health in Full Retreat (Modern Healthcare, 9/12/19) I commented:
My White Friend Asked Me on Facebook to Explain White Privilege. I Decided to Be Honest (9/8/2017)
What Is White Privilege, Really? (Fall 2018 teaching materials) Recognizing white privilege begins with truly understanding the term itself.
Thanks for your phone response to my article. Here are FOUR THOUGHTS:
1. Like it or not, hospital emergency rooms are already required to treat everyone, and if a patient is indigent and unable to pay, and the hospital is unable to collect later, then the cost is passed on to the rest of us. The ER, however, is the most expensive treatment. Much better would be a focus on health and prevention, whether that’s through regular preventative care in a clinic or improved nutrition, exercise, sleep, and stress management.
2. The question of who pays gets into the issue of, “What’s the proper role of government.” A true fiscal conservative would see the economic benefits of public investments in a healthy, skilled, well paid, and productive workforce, because it not only increases demand for goods and services and thus demand for more workers, but it also improves profits, economic growth, GDP, and global competitiveness.
3. Some functions are best left the private sector and free-market capitalism, but that doesn’t really work in healthcare. People have no negotiating power when they’re sick, in pain, or could die, so they’ll pay ANYTHING. The industry knows that and prices accordingly when there’s no regulatory limits. And people can’t comparison shop when prices are kept secret and not disclosed in advance. See “Get the Health Incentives Right” (https://mhealthtalk.com/cazitech/incentives/).
4. With 2018 revenues of $3.65 trillion (almost 18% of GDP), the profit motive has infected the healthcare industry like a cancer that threatens our very lives and livelihood. No wonder the medical industrial complex fights so fiercely against any reform that would result in a $1.5 trillion loss of revenue and affect profits and jobs. That’s what we’d save if U.S. per capita spending matched what other advanced nations spend. See “AMERICA BROKEN: critiquing Capitalism, Healthcare & Politics” (https://mHealthTalk.com/broken/.