As we celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day, it is a good time to remember the long-standing ethnic disparity in the US health care system. In 1966 MLK observed: “Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health is the most shocking and inhuman.” Some of these disparities are blatant, like having a separate “Indian Health System” for ethnic Native Americans, while other discriminations are more insidious.
One example of the subtle forms of inequality arises from the differences in insurance plans. It is an unfortunate fact that many doctors and health care facilities do not take Medicaid, because Medicaid pays the provider significantly less (sometimes 60% less) than Medicare or commercial insurance. Since Medicaid recipients are more likely to be people of color, the result is a predominant racial inequality to access.
Because these and many other inequities are entrenched in our healthcare system, they cannot be fixed by the limited insurance reform that seems to be the focus of almost all current proposals for its reform. The only solution is comprehensive infrastructure reform, as found in the #EMBRACE plan. #healthcarereform #healthcare
Read more about EMBRACE in my book, Building a Unified American Health Care System: A Blueprint for Comprehensive Reform
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