The Christian Case for Universal Healthcare

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In many places around the world, healthcare is a live political issue, especially in the US where there are millions of people without adequate health care, where medical bankruptcies are common, there are problems accessing insurance, the Obamacare wars of the last decade, and government in bed with Big Pharma.

Healthcare is a controversial topic in other places too, esp. when it comes to things like co-payments, waiting lists, costs, and sustainability.

Nonetheless, every western democracy from Norway to New Zealand has universal healthcare for its citizens except for one of the most prosperous nations on earth, i.e., the USA.

There’s a lot of misconceptions about universal healthcare, that it is “socialized medicine” and leads to “rationing” of medicines, or even “death panels.” So let me point out several things:

1. Christian Advocacy for Healthcare. The introduction of universal healthcare has been driven by a Christian ethic of compassion. Jesus healed all who came to him, the early church was known for its care for the infirm and dying, Christians created the first hospitals, as well as the hospice movement, there are several successful Christian medical missions in the developing world. I know someone will say , “The church should do that not the government!” The problem is that would require the church to become a bureaucratic instrument between healthcare givers, insurers, patients, government, pharmaceutical industry, and medical research. Churches might run hospitals or clinics, but they should not run a country’s health system - otherwise the separation of church and state is endangered. Christians and other religious bodies are better situated to advocate to government for healthcare services and to work at a local level with their own healthcare ministries.

2. Varieties of Universal Healthcare. Contrary to popular opinions, universal healthcare is not all socialism and death panels. Australia is not a European socialist state, nor is New Zealand where much cost for public health care is still borne by the individual. Note also that there are a variety of models of government healthcare. The UK and Australian models are very different. In Australia we have a two-track system with public health and private health sectors. I use the public system to see my GP, but I go to a physiotherapist through my private health fund. Yet in the UK there is virtually no private healthcare with only a few private hospitals for the super-rich. Governments subsidize health care and insurance to different extents depending on the country. So universal healthcare comes in many shapes and forms.

3. The Testimony of Americans Who Have Shifted Their Views. My friend Dr. Jason Sexton (UCLA) told me about his family’s experience of European healthcare. While in France doing a language course, his daughter Kara became critically ill with a cavernoma vascular malformation that had hemorrhaged on the left lobe of her brain. Jason told me:

When we were in Paris last summer, the leading pediatric neurosurgeon who performed my daughter’s emergency brain surgery, who trained under the leading neurosurgeon in Great Ormond Street, London, saw me editing my thesis beside my daughter’s bed in the Parisian ICU, and asked, “Are you a student?” I replied that I was finishing my PhD at St Andrews in theology. After this, he asked if we had spoken to the social worker (who were somewhat reluctant to acknowledge the fact that we were Americans in Paris on a language course with the Catholic University of Paris who had virtually “no money”). I had a date to speak with the social worker the next day, at which point the world-class and leading neurosurgeon at L’hopital Necker, the oldest children’s hospital in the world, told me: “The doctors in Paris, we’re not rich, and don’t make a lot of money. We’re not like the States – we don’t like to take the money from the families.” He was obviously aware of the inflated medical and insurance costs in the US, and wanted to encourage us in this moment. We expected the surgery and hospital costs to be outrageous, of course. But after hearing this from Kara’s surgeon, and also learning around this time that the British NHS was willing to fully reimburse our somewhat nominal hospital costs in Paris (after three weeks in Paris). We, of course, had some extra unexpected travel, lodging, and living costs, which prompted believers from all around the world to assist us financially. But after hearing this from the neurosurgeon, my wife and I breathed a sigh of relief, knowing we were cared for by some of the world’s most skilled specialist hands and minds, and that the French (and British) somehow were caring for us in profound ways that cost them something. And in this moment, we knew God was caring for us and our little girl in the very best means possible.

Dr. Christopher Hays is an American with a Ph.D from Oxford who has done post-doctoral work in the UK and Germany and current serves as a missionary in Columbia, listen to his story:

Since most testimonials in this blog-entry will probably focus on the UK, let me comment on Germany, where I lived and worked for two years. German UHC requires everyone to purchase health insurance. Since I was a low-income student with a wife and two children, I paid 45 Euro a month for the state-backed insurance. This got me full medical and dental coverage (best dental care we ever received). There were co-pays: 10 Euro per quarter covers your contribution for all medical and dental fees. And when my wife got pneumonia and had to be hospitalized for 10 days, we spent a grand total of 100 Euro. When Michelle was hospitalized, even though I knew we were well-insured, I still thought that we’d be in financial trouble; after all, I’d have to take a lot of time off of my non-salaried work to watch our boys and help Michelle recover. But I shouldn’t have worried: my insurance paid 90% of my wages. And if I couldn’t have left work for other reasons, then insurance would have paid to hire someone to come watch the boys, cook, clean, and buy groceries. So when Michelle got sick, instead of worrying about money, all I had to worry about was helping her get better.  Of course, someone had to pay for that. The German people and my tax-dollars paid for it. But nobody begrudged the fact that a foreigner in a low tax-bracket was getting proper medical care. Why? Because in Europe and the Commonwealth people have a much broader understanding of human rights. Since most testimonials in this blog-entry will probably focus on the UK, let me comment on Germany, where I lived and worked for two years. German UHC requires everyone to purchase health insurance. Since I was a low-income student with a wife and two children, I paid 45 Euro a month for the state-backed insurance. This got me full medical and dental coverage (best dental care we ever received). There were co-pays: 10 Euro per quarter covers your contribution for all medical and dental fees. And when my wife got pneumonia and had to be hospitalized for 10 days, we spent a grand total of 100 Euro. When Michelle was hospitalized, even though I knew we were well-insured, I still thought that we’d be in financial trouble; after all, I’d have to take a lot of time off of my non-salaried work to watch our boys and help Michelle recover. But I shouldn’t have worried: my insurance paid 90% of my wages. And if I couldn’t have left work for other reasons, then insurance would have paid to hire someone to come watch the boys, cook, clean, and buy groceries. So when Michelle got sick, instead of worrying about money, all I had to worry about was helping her get better. Of course, someone had to pay for that. The German people and my tax-dollars paid for it. But nobody begrudged the fact that a foreigner in a low tax-bracket was getting proper medical care. Why? Because in Europe and the Commonwealth people have a much broader understanding of human rights.

No doubt more could be said, pro and con for universal healthcare, but I’ll leave it there.