SOC 490-2 Week 1

The question of healthcare being a right or a privilege is a very tough question to answer. Yes, all human beings deserve the right to healthcare. If a person is sick, it should not matter whether they are filthy rich, or dirt poor, they should get the treatment needed. No one deserves to suffer because of an illness, it does not matter who they are or what they have done with their lives.

But at the same time, does someone that lives on the street deserve the exact same healthcare as someone that works and can afford the best treatments out there? That is where the privileged part comes in. Healthcare, in a sense, should be a privilege because it really is not fair for people in two complete different social classes to receive the exact same health care.

As the United States is debating going to universal healthcare, with the idea of healthcare being a right in mind, John C. Goodman reminds us in Healthcare Opposing Viewpoints that "no country with national health insurance has established a right to health care." Goodman goes on to explain that citizens in these countries have no rights to any health care service, and when they need a treatment, they have to wait months, sometimes about a year, to get that treatment. Goodman states that "during one 12-month period in Ontario, Canada, 71 patients died waiting for coronary bypass surgery while 121 patients were removed from the list because they had become too sick to undergo surgery with a reasonable chance of survival."

It is hard to say whether healthcare should be a right or a privilege. As everyone deserves treatment if they are sick, should the people that can afford the best healthcare have to wait a year for treatment? Therefore, in my opinion, healthcare is neither a right or a privilege, but a combination of the two.