> 45,000 Americans die every year due to lack of coverage
Sorry, no. That claim is often made, but it's just nonsense.
Every time we've had a BETTER sort of study - had the chance to examine a situation in which people are randomly assigned to either have low-deductible health coverage or not have it - there has been no significant health benefit to having the "better" health coverage.
The first such study was the RAND study in the 1970s. The most recent one was the Oregon study described here:
Quote:
"a large-scale randomized controlled trial (RCT) of what happens to people when they gain Medicaid eligibility shows no impact on objective measures of health. Utilization went up, out-of-pocket expenditure went down, and the freqency of depression diagnoses was lower. But on the three important health measures they checked that we can measure objectively--glycated hemoglobin, a measure of blood sugar levels; blood pressure; and cholesterol levels--there was no significant improvement."
Sorry, no. That claim is often made, but it's just nonsense.
Every time we've had a BETTER sort of study - had the chance to examine a situation in which people are randomly assigned to either have low-deductible health coverage or not have it - there has been no significant health benefit to having the "better" health coverage.
The first such study was the RAND study in the 1970s. The most recent one was the Oregon study described here:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/05/01/shocker-ore...
Quote: "a large-scale randomized controlled trial (RCT) of what happens to people when they gain Medicaid eligibility shows no impact on objective measures of health. Utilization went up, out-of-pocket expenditure went down, and the freqency of depression diagnoses was lower. But on the three important health measures they checked that we can measure objectively--glycated hemoglobin, a measure of blood sugar levels; blood pressure; and cholesterol levels--there was no significant improvement."
Good followup analysis here:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/05/03/how-the-ore...