Soc 490 week one

                                                Health care, a right or a privilege?
     Rights and Privilege, what do they mean? What is the accepted definition of the two words?  A right is a moral or legal entitlement to have or do something. A privilege is a special right, advantage, or immunity for a particular person. To me, a right is something you are born with, like the right to live life how you want it or do what you want while abiding by the laws or freedom of religion, speech and press. A privilage is something you have to earn or work for, behaving approprietly or following the laws, not just given to you. As society today is growing more and more, people are becoming more and more greedy, lazy or wanting the good things in life handed to them, with no effort on  their part. My health care is given to me from my parents who work hard to have the privalege to be under a good insurence company, it is not given to them becuase they needed it but because they work for it.
     As for the four opinions from the book "Universal Health Care", two said it was a right and the other two said it was a privilage. I agree with Peikoff because of several statements he said in his artical. He state "we are not born with the trip to disneyland, or a meal at McDonalds,...", this is absolutly true, yes we have the freedom to go to Disneyworld but you have to earn money to be able to go and then you can have the privilage to go. Now, sometimes a person may win a trip to the magical kingdom, well that just luck or maybe a parent has a dying child and the make a wish foundation gives the family a trip, that was through a strenous trial of pain and eventually death that a family like that is able to go. Going to disneyland is not a right but a privilage. In Creech's article he uses the bible and what it says as a means to defend universal healthcare being wrong. He states that the bible discourages economic systems that construct dependence or reward sloth. He even quoptes a bible verse backing up his opinion, Thessalonions 3:10. He makes a point that a universal government healthcare system is a form of socialised medicine and destroy professional freedom for medical proffesions and since I am in the medical field, i agree with him.Also with the point he makes about the quality of health care lessen when the government has to make healthcare affordable and mandatory for everyone.
     As for the other two articles I do not agree with them because they make the view of healthcare being affordable for everyone and it is a right. In Redmonds article, she states that people are not free with the healthcare system the way it is today. Like the mentally ill are not free becauss they are unable to get insurence and they end up in jail, or her statement "jails and prisons have become de facto psychiatric treatment facilities for the mentally ill. First of all this is a false statement, where are her facts or research. Jail and prisions are filled with people who either deserve to be in there for a crime they have commited or because they may cause a threat to others or themselves. In American today there are a number of facilities that help the mentally ill and or homeless for free, they just happen to have rules, sometimes strict rules that some choose not to follow. Now, yes some people with mental illnesses do have a mental illness that need help and cannot get it and this is obviuosly a matter needing a solution. as for the other article, by the Interfaith canter on Corporate Responsibility, "a call for accesible and affordable health care for all people in a just and compassionate healthcare system.....faith based investors believe it is in the economic intrest of companies....". Yes, we do need a just healthcare system but because people will take advantage of the system or abuse privilages or stretch the limits of their rights, a just and compassionate system is not a possibility. Healthcare that is affordable and comprehensive for everyone is not in the economys intrest, how is the government going to pay for the lower half of american that cannot afford it? Raise the taxes of the people who can, insurence companies raising premiums and deductiples, thus making healthcare unaffordable for for the higher margin.
     The battle of healthcare will be a struggling battle for the years ahead, there will never be a perfect solution or a plan that makes everyone happy. No matter what is decided on or who think "this will work for everyone" they are all wrong. Making healthcare affordable for everyone or enabling everyone to get coverage is a double edged sword. Now, in my opinion a goverment involved healthcare or government run system is the absolute wrong path to go, the more the government gets theri head up everyone's butt, the less freedom we have as americans, next the government will draw our names out of a hat to decide what job we can have or what house we get to live in or even the food we eat. Healthcare is a privilager for the people who earn it, whether it is a sick or dying child, an elderly man who needs help, a war veteren needing care after fighting for our freedom, or a hard working american not sitting on there butts expecting soemone else to take care of them.