Health Policy And Politics

Healthcare Policy and Politics

Name

Institution

Health Policy and Politics

When we talk about politics, we mean to say the assemblage of multifaceted activities that are essentially associated with the management and governance of the country or state as a whole. Decision making is the crux of politics that apply to all the members of the group elected by the community members. In other words, politics can be defined as the system in which a governing body observes and develops systematic and formalized decisions regarding troubles, challenges and issues encountered by the community particularly a state (Rod & Martin, 2013). Besides challenges, it aims at modifying and raising the standard of living of the common people.

Politics works through agenda setting; a process referred to as the determination and adoption of issues confronted by the society at macro level as a policy problem (Schaefer & Robert, 2004). In this process, social issues such as education, healthcare, employment and safety are chosen at governmental level and undergo policy making for the active eradication of current problem or modification of already existing management interventions. Hence, agenda setting acts as a bridge between governmental considerations and community problems (Rod & Martin, 2013).

Maintenance of the healthcare facilities is the main focus of this paper. Physical, mental and emotional wellbeing is the basic right of individuals. Wellbeing is termed as the perceived state of satisfaction, contentment, happiness and desirability in physical and emotional terms (Schaefer & Robert, 2004). Healthcare facilities comprise the primordial section in governmental policy making encapsulating clinics, hospitals, specialized care centers, outpatient care center for example, psychiatric care centers and birthing centers, advanced healthcare tools, utilization of technology, medicines, sufficient nursing staff and fiscal resources.

Government plays irrefutably significant role in the development of policies aimed at ensuring the healthcare rights of common people. After contemplating through the lens of history, various examples were found to stand by this case. For example, the Centers and Medicare and Medicaid Services (CSM), expanded by President Bush, are responsible for administering a federal healthcare program for adults of 65 years or more with any physical or mental disabilities (Schaefer & Robert, 2004). This program works in collaboration with the state government for executing Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) and Medicaid, an aggregation of federal state programs for particular underserved populations. Medicare Modernization Act of 2003 was presented by Bush administration for executing monumental reforms in ensuring the sufficient production of drugs and their equitable distribution to the masses (Schaefer & Robert, 2004).

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) was developed and enacted in 2010 by President Obama administration for the establishment of shared responsibility between government, private stakeholders, employers and common people aimed at ensuring their access to good-quality and affordable healthcare insurance. However, there is always persistent a substantial discrepancy between the development and execution of such agendas and similar trend was inspected in ACA reforms (Amadeo, 2019). It was undoubtedly an excellent initiative yet the healthcare coverage remained fragmented and this disintegration raised a questionable degree of concerns regarding governmental efforts as there was seen a wide gap between the equitable access of rich and poor to the advanced and affordable healthcare facilities.

Recently, The Trump administration released its healthcare policies for the fiscal year 2019. After deliberate contemplation of his expressed vision, it seems as if he supported deep cuts to healthcare programs, skyrocketing out-of-pocket expenses for the patients and their families and reduced access to the essentially required services. For example, ACA cuts comprised $675 billion, Medicaid cuts were documented as $1.4 trillion for the next ten years and U.S (Fishman & Sheehan, 2019). Department of Health and Human Services cuts for the next 20 years are expected to hamper the HHS’s autonomy and efficacy to a substantial degree. Hence, it can be inferred that politics plays an important part in determining the wellbeing of individuals in future; this is why it is one of the most hotly debated agenda items.

References

Schaefer, N. O., & Robert, M. (2004). An Examination of the Bush Health Care Agenda. The Heritage Foundation. Retrieved from https://www.heritage.org/health-care-reform/report/examination-the-bush-health-care-agenda

Amadeo, K. (2019). Obama's Health Care Reform Plan; How Insurance Companies Changed Obama's Healthcare Reform Plan. The Balance. Retrieved from https://www.thebalance.com/obama-s-health-care-reform-plan-3305753

Fishman, E. & Sheehan, J. (2019). The Trump Administration’s Blueprint for Health Care. FamiliesUSA. Retrieved from https://familiesusa.org/product/trump-administrations-blueprint-health-care

Rod H. & Martin, H. (2013). Comparative Government and Politics: An Introduction. Macmillan International Higher Education.1–3.