Former Medical physicist, Patrick Moore, on the prospects of providing accessible health care for each and every resident

Patrick Moore, a former Medical physicist of the US Oncology in Indiana, estimates the US access to health care as one of the poorest overall. And the statistics confirm his statement. Even though the US is second in measures of the health care process, we are also ranked last overall on access to medical care. At the same time, America spends a significant part of its GDP on it.

“About 1 in 10 residents have no health insurance policy.” - states Patrick Moore. “If we look in sections, we see that young people, Latinos, and people with below-average incomes are most likely to be uninsured.” And even though the majority (about 91.4% of the population) have health insurance policies and can access healthcare, we still have a large segment of people who are unable to pay their medical expenses if they suddenly face some health problems.

However, the government does not support people in gaining access to medical care. Therefore, every time Americans or visitors get medical care, someone should pay for it. It may be out-of-pocket costs or some expenses covered by your health insurance policy. “By the way, even if you have a healthcare insurance policy, you will probably still have to cover some of your medical expenses out of pocket. There are many medical expenses that are outside the scope of the insurance plan, even if you have a platinum one. I've worked with a lot of people who were forced to pay tens of thousands of dollars out of pocket when it came to oncology.” - Patrick Moore states.

Of course, any medical expenses are, among other things, someone's wage. Salaries in medicine are high, so not everyone can afford access to high-quality healthcare. “Many people have limited access to needed medical services or even may not have it at all. Limited availability of health care resources may increase the risk of poor health outcomes and health disparities,” - Patrick Moore says.

Mr. Moore strongly believes we need to pay more attention to this issue. With the research on identifying the weakest points in our almost broken healthcare system, we must develop insurance programs that could cover all the needed services and also provide benefits for vulnerable and needy categories of residents.