There are tons of statistics floating around during the current debate
over health care reform. One statistic, however, leaped out at me while
reading this month's AARP Bulletin. In a pie chart showing how
most people are currently covered by an insurance policy, either by
government or private providers, there are today more people without
health insurance than there are covered by Medicare, 46 million versus
43 million. I don't know why this one statistic particularly caught my eye but it told me in stark terms that there are an awful lot of people in this country who scramble everyday to avoid being sick, getting sick, or are sick.
Yes, I was aware of the uninsured numbers but for some reason I thought there would be more folks on Medicare than those who don't have insurance of any kind.
Current debate about extending Medicare to those below the age of 65 says about 13 million more people would be covered by Medicare if the age were lowered to 55, fully 17 million more if lowered to 50.
Is it possible that we could lower the number of uninsured to zero by extending Medicare to All? Now that would be health care reform worthy of "change we can believe in."
