Forgive Democrats if their victory cries sound more like whispers. The US House of Representatives only narrowly approved President Obama's landmark healthcare reform legislation this week – 39 Democrats voted against it. Many Democrats also oppose a provision in the bill that limits the use of federal funds for abortion services, and they plan to derail it before it is finalised.
This won't be the only hurdle the bill faces in the Senate, where it has not even taken shape yet. Senate debate won't begin until next week at the earliest, and back-room negotiations could a delay debate until after the Thanksgiving holiday in late November.
Democrat leader Harry Reid says he is determined to include some kind of government-run health plan – the public option – in the bill, but Democrats disagree over the conditions under which citizens will be allowed to purchase the plan.
What's more, Connecticut senator Joseph Lieberman, part of a fragile 60-vote majority needed to advance the bill, has vowed to oppose anything that includes said public option. Moderate Senate Democrats, meanwhile, are also worried about the cost of the legislation and new taxes in the House version.
If the Senate does pass a bill, it must then be reconciled with the House version, which Congress as a whole will have to approve before it becomes law. All of this suggests that President Obama's chances of signing a healthcare bill into law by the end of the year look slim – though he says he remains "absolutely confident".
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Have your say
Why? Where's the science input?
Why do those with a left-wing perspective keep pushing this? You have a system that works for 85% (17 out of 20) that you want to socialize for a few hard cases to win votes.
Much like the world economy was ground down by giving loans to people who couldn't afford them to get votes by forcing banks and credit agencies to lie by law, you know want to grind down the best health system in the world to UK standards and death rates.
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Jon Madams,
Why shouldnt everyone be able to see a doc when they are sick?
Do you know it costs an amazing $250k if you break a leg and have to stay in a hospital for a few days in the US???
Same thing with same quality care costs $5k in Singapore, Korea, or India.
Best health care in the world my behind.
Complete and total lie.
I've had a shattered leg and had to stay in the hospital a couple of weeks and it was around 10k
Well I live in the U.S. and I have lived in other countries. If the U.S. has the best health care system in the world then we must live in totally different planets, maybe even different universes. I do not mind different points of view. Hey if you are a Social Darwinist I will not like you, but in a free society we do not have to like each other, that is fine. But would you free market jihadist please stop making up your own facts, it is very annoying. The world is round, it moves around the sun, evolution happened, and we DO NOT HAVE the best health care system in the world. Those are facts. It is hard to have any sort of dialogue when your own made up imaginary reality makes you blind to the real world. I think free market jihadist hate reality for the same reason all other jihadist hate reality, it has a liberal bias
"you know want to grind down the best health system in the world to UK standards and death rates."
Yeah, right. Stephen Hawking would have died years ago if he'd been treated on the NHS....oh, wait, he was.
I do wonder why this was included. I just had a glance at other "US National Interest" stories, and they did have a link with science.
However, the reaction from the reactionists is quite entertaining - if they've ever read "the rag" before, they'd be well aware of the political leanings. So why the outrage? Next you'll be getting upset because NS disses creationism!
Are you sure about that? I saw some of the "facts" the Republican party were quoting, and was astonished at how inaccurate they were.
Infant mortality rate(per k): UK 4.8 USA 6.3
Of the 15% of GDP the US spends on healthcare annually (about $2.2tn) around 50% is spent by the Government (about $1.1tn)
By contrast, the UK spends around 8% of it's GDP on healthcare with the NHS budget of £94bn ($155bn)
The English NHS cares for 49 million people (100% of the population of England); US public healthcare currently covers about 83 million (around 28% of the US population).
For a direct comparison, that means that in England the government spends around $3,200 per capita on healthcare and covers the entire population whereas in the US the federal government spends around $3,700 per capita and yet covers less than a third of the population.
You may be right that the US healthcare system is the best in the world, but only for the minority of the the richest. Most of your population has inadequate cover. The enlightened nations of the world abandoned this sytem many generations ago, seeing is as befitting of our position as the only moral creatures on the planet to support universal healthcare for all, not just those that can afford it.
I find your position abhorent, and sincerely hope that the US will catch up to the rest of us soon, but doubt it as the default american question is "why should i?"
"I saw some of the "facts" the Republican party were quoting, and was astonished at how inaccurate they were." - Toby
Are you surprised? Haven't I been telling New Scientist readers for years that I have never encountered a Conservative who wasn't a congenital and perpetual liar?
Did you think I was joking?
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So you finally admit your nothing but a liberal rag, New Scientist?
Congratulations on coming out of the closet with this non-defensibly, out-of-scope article.
I don't see anything in this article that indicates that New Scientist is for or against government healthcare
In a word "incongruous" or out-of-place.
There's no "hook" making it a science story marking it as an obvious pet interest of the writer.
Since the mediocritization of the US health-care system is a socialist agenda (despite working for 17/20 Americans), we can only conclude that the writer and in general, the staff of NS have a left wing bias.
Hope that helps.
"There's no "hook" making it a science story marking it as an obvious pet interest of the writer." - John Adams
I note that many of the advertisments don't have any hook to science either.
Why should ignore one group and not the other?
It smells to me like you are exceptionally biased.
"So you finally admit your nothing but a liberal rag, New Scientist?" - Mark Rock
Mark Rock believes that universal health care is an integral property of Liberalism.
If so then the denial of health care must be an integral property of Conservatism.
Since health care is a fundamental human right, and it's provision for any moral society, I can only conclude that Conservatism as demanded by Mark Rock, is a fundamentally immoral ideology.
No other conclusion is rationally possible.
Free food, free housing, free healthcare, free pedicure... none of these are human rights. Freedom to earn them is.
Get a clue.
so your saying all the people with no food, no shelter,and no healthcare have simply never earned them. So someone who spends all his time doing backbreaking labor for minimum wage has never done anything to earn a home or medicine but a CEO who sits at a desk all day has earned the right to have a private island with mansion yacht and plane. Of course. Stupid me. I always thought that to earn meant to work. I guess i am sadly mistaken.
I think its obvious I was being sarcastic there but then again even the most obvious things tend to go right over the head of a few members of our society.
Go on, mooch your way to world domination by socialists and stagnation.
The vast majority of Americans have excellent health care. For a few deadbeats you want to mediocritize it.
Remember who caused the credit crunch and why? A few deadbeats couldn't get loans so the government FORCED banks to give loans and FORCED credit reference agencies to lie about the repackaged mortgage financial products.
Not being content with that mess, they want to do the same with your health.
Government control of anything leads to stagnation and waste. Hey, why not let worldwide socialists take control of everything? Just imagine energy, food, pharma, the media, your holiday, clothing, entertainment, music, film, SCIENCE, THE TRUTH...
Much as they found out in the soviet block 20 years ago, it all ground to a halt and even the state controlled media couldn't cover up the lies.
Perhaps we should rename NS "Pravda" or "Minitrue" (Ministry of Truth)?
If this worldwide socialist conspiracy carries on, I fear we are fast heading to a new dark ages.
It has to be fought as a new Cold War II. This time the cancer has infiltrated far into the life support.
"Free food, free housing, free healthcare, free pedicure... none of these are human rights." - Immoral American
Universal declaration of human rights.
Article 25
•(1) Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.
It is interesting to note that the United States under the Bush Regime has most recently violated articles 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, and 13.
In addition their Conservative supporters are plottng to violate articles, 21, 22, 24, 25, 26, 28 and 30.
http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/
Conservatism as practiced in the U.S is pure, unmitigated Evil.
""Free food, free housing, free healthcare, free pedicure... none of these are human rights." - Immoral American
Universal declaration of human rights.
Article 25"
Try that on some barren rocky outcrop. No-one to loot you see...
There are no rights, only products of the minds of better people that the looterist charter seeks to steal.
of course New Scientist is liberal, science itself is liberal-biased, as is wikipedia and any other fact or evidence-based person or institution
Really? Prove it!
You'll find any institution that bases itself on evidence and rationalism is inherently liberal. That encompasses science as a discipline, which is what this magazine comments on.
No, anything based on evidence and rationalism is objective and probably dead-center (positive science vs. normative science)
Right on Mark, John and Vendi.
Those liberals turn everything they touch into a bureaucratically administered mess. Would you want your health care provider to be the same as your postal system provider?
To reward the mediocre and sub-par is to facilitate wide spread underachievement.
"Government control of anything leads to stagnation and waste." If you truly agree with these sentiments Mark, John and Vendi then I extend an open invitation for you to visit me in my country and see what can be achieved with a totally decentralist attitude.
Come to the libertarian paradise that is my home Somalia. A country free of pesky government intervention in any and all markets.
P.s The worlds best health care means you all have healthy Kidneys right?
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