The American health care sector has many topics of controversy and is one of the major problems facing the American people. Healthcare in the US is one of the most expensive services, and the government has been trying to make it possible for everyone to access it. The Affordable Care Act, commonly known as the Obamacare has tried to eradicate the unfairness in the healthcare provision. From the time in history, wealthier people have received better health care compared to the poor, so do men compared to women, and younger people compared to the older ones. Full implementation of Obamacare finally eradicates this unfairness. People should not be denied health insurance covers because of their poor economic status, or their health, age or gender. The cost-sharing of health care that Obamacare introduces is a good solution since when everyone is healthy, the economy improves and benefits everyone despite their financial status, gender or age.
Sociologists analyze health and medicine in terms of their influence to the society (Timmerman & Steven, 2008). In the past, health and medicine were attributed to nature. Sociologists now demonstrate how the spread of diseases and access to treatment is greatly influenced by socioeconomic status, beliefs, and other cultural factors.
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Karen Palmer, a professor of health science at Simon Fraser University asserts that the current system of US healthcare has its roots back in World War II after President Franklin Roosevelt imposed a freeze on labor wages after which companies started to offer health and pension as a way of keeping their employees instead (Merelli, 2017). Unions concentrated on what they would get the employees, but the rest of the population remained uncovered since no one pressured the government to create a public health system. Conflict sociologists would argue that this is discrimination against the poor, unemployed people. Functionalists would also view this system as a non-functional one since they believe that every group of people in the society has a function that makes the society complete. Symbolic interactionists would view this system as a symbolism of the little or no concern that the government has for the poor population, and the little or no say that the poor population has on government policies. This is because the system only favors those employed by big companies as well as those who can cater for their health care expenses on their own, leaving out the unemployed, the low-income earners self-employed and those whose employers cannot afford to cover them.
References
Merelli, A. (2017). A History of Why the US is The Only Rich Country Without Universal Health Care. Retrieved From https://qz.com/1022831/why-doesnt-the-united-states-have-universal-health-care/
Timmermans, S., Steven, H. (2008). Towards a Sociology of Health and Illness. Sociology of Health and Illness, Vol. 30, No. 5. Pg. 659-676
