What is medical tourism? Medical tourism is the conscious choice to travel to another country in order to receive healthcare. There are various reasons why people engage in medical tourism. For instance, one reason is to receive treatment that is not available from the country in which you live. Thus, it is not unusual for the very rich in the Global South to travel to a First World country because they have the technology available that is not available in the home country of that very rich person. This type of tourism is also true of those who may go to Mexico or Canada or Europe to receive a treatment or a medication that is not yet available in the USA.
Another reason is to save money. There have been stories of buses of seniors from the USA crossing into either Mexico or Canada to buy pharmaceuticals at a significantly cheaper price than in the USA. The savings on those medicines are so significant that the seniors can afford the bus trip. For a while, there was a trend to go to Spain for hip replacement surgery because the savings was so large that it paid for the entire round-trip. Some USA insurance companies were even persuaded to pay for the hip replacement and part of the travel expenses because it was a win-win for both the insurance company and the insuree.
The final reason is for convenience. Those are the people who travel because they can receive treatment quicker in the country to which they travel than the country in which they live. In this type of tourism, there is no intent to save money, it is purely an unwillingness to wait in line.
The problem that I have is when various types of medical tourism are tendered in argument to supposedly say that the healthcare systems that are common in all other First Word countries, except the USA, will somehow destroy the USA should we adopt the common way of ensuring that the population has true access to healthcare regardless of level of income. So let´s take a look at at least two of those arguments.
You might be surprised at how often someone argues that because Canadians come to the USA to receive quicker treatment that this is proof of how bad it would be to adopt a similar system. Here are the fallacies in that argument. First, the Canadians who are coming over to receive that quicker care are those that have so much disposable income that they can afford to pay the significantly higher prices of healthcare in the USA. This is not an alternative that is open to even the middle-middle or to the lower-middle class. Second, usually there is no proof that the delay in treatment will affect the long-term health of the patient. An elective procedure may be delayed for reasons of availability, convenience, etc., none of which are reasons that point to endangering the patient.
I should note that there are indeed one or two stories of treatment being delayed that did adversely affect the health of a Canadian or an English citizen, etc. But, in every case that I have read the case makes the news because it is such a scandal. Usually, investigations are launched. In other words, this is not a result of the system, but a result of someone making a mistake. Some time, look up the medical malpractice rates in the USA and think of how many wrong decisions have been made in this system. Wrong decisions do not necessarily mean that a system is bad. Finally, the reality is that most often what I am told is not a documented tale, but an apocryphal tale, the famous friend of a friend story. This type of tale is useless, as it is devoid of any fact or proof, but it lives on the level of a fairy tale.
I note that those who argue about the visitors from Canada have never ever mentioned those from the USA who go to Canada to buy medicines because they save so much money. It is a monocular view of the challenges of healthcare, in which only the negatives of the other systems are quoted. Yet, here is the reality of medical tourism. Medical tourism is an avocation of those who already have some disposable income. Most in Canada cannot afford to come here for medical tourism. Most of the lower-middle class or the poor from the USA have no access to either Canada or Mexico in order to save money on medicines, and they certainly have zero access to Spain in order to save money on a hip replacement.
There are additional arguments bruited. For instance, stories are cherry-picked, particularly from England (for some reason) about how supposedly horrible the system is. Yet, every year many Americans deliberately travel to parts of Europe in order to receive either a better or an equal-but-cheaper treatment than can be received in the USA. Our medical tourism regularly contradicts those who use medical tourism to this country as proof that our system is better. It is not. Our medical tourism shows other First World medical care to be every bit as good as ours.
There is also a tax argument made. As best I can tell the argument is that I will play the lottery with my health. Assuming that I will be basically healthy all of my life, I am willing to take the chance that I will never need the expensive high-level care that will bankrupt us and will leave us impoverished and maybe homeless. It is playing Russian roulette with all that you have gathered. But worse, when the time comes that you are losing it all, you will go to GoFund or to the news media and cry your tears about how you are going to lose it all. You will pressure the hospital to give you free treatment. You will turn into a taker and justify it because you need to save yourself or save your spouse or save your child. And yet, even then, you will not see the utter contradiction of the position you took. If we were to be consistent with you, we would tell you to be warmed and be filled and that you made your bed now lie on it. That is what already happens to all too many Americans.
I will stop here, however, there really is much more that could be said. For instance, I have not even brought up our Christian and social responsibilities to care for each other. I will simply point to the Old Testament. You should read the various laws that had to do with an Israeli’s responsibility to the poor, the widow, and the orphan within their country. That merits its own post. But, please stop using medical tourism as though it were an argument against all other systems but ours.
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