Newsweek - USA (2020-03-20)

24 NEWSWEEK.COM MARCH 27, 2020

HEALTH CARE

edicare for all” is probably the
best-known plank in Senator Bernie
Sanders’ campaign platform. He
wants the federal government to take over private
health care insurance and replace it with a compre-
hensive, single-payer program. Under this plan, ev-
ery U.S. resident would automatically be insured for
nearly every contingency—hospital stays, dental care,
mental health, ambulance services and long-term
care, among other things—with nearly no copays or
deductibles. Grandma needs a nursing home? That’s
covered. Your son needs counseling for a drug addic-
tion? Covered. No surprise bills, no copays.
Critics slam the plan as too expensive; Sanders
insists it would save money overall. Everyone agrees,
however, that Medicare for All would amount to a
massive transfer of spending from the private sec-
tor to the U.S. government. And there lies the rub.
Can the U.S. government be trusted to manage a
complex, fast-moving industry in which innovation
and efficiency—qualities more often associated
with the private sector than a government bureau-
cracy—are matters of life and death for so many
Americans? The question makes many people ner-
vous and puts Sanders’ supporters on the defensive.
What goes largely unappreciated in this debate
is that the U.S. government already owns and runs
one of the most successful health care operations
in the world. It’s taken on the care of millions of
some of America’s most challenging patients, in-
cluding residents of isolated rural communities
and older patients who need long-term care. It does
so while eliminating many of the racial disparities
that haunt American health care. It trains most
of America’s doctors. It is a leader in telehealth,
electronic health care records, precision medicine
and many other important, forward-looking tech-
nologies. It earns quality-of-care ratings that most
hospitals would envy. It keeps costs generally below
average and charges most patients little or nothing.
The system is the Veterans Health Administration—
commonly referred to as the VA, after the broader
agency that runs it, the U.S. Department of Veterans
Affairs—along with the Walter Reed National Mili-
tary Medical Center, operated by the Defense Depart-
ment. Walter Reed serves about a million active-duty
military personnel, military retirees and others. The
VA serves about 9 million patients, the vast majori-
ty of whom are U.S. military veterans. It provides

TOP RATINGS

Government hospitals, a

study found, outperformed

many private hospitals in

quality of care. Clockwise

from right: Navy veteran

Robert Hansen at a

memorial ceremony in San

Francisco in 2017; Bernie

Sanders gets a primer

on telehealth technology

with the VA’s Dr. Robert A.

Petzel (to his left) and Dr.

Tommy Sowers, in 2013;

Bethesda Naval Hospital,

now Walter Reed, in 2007. CL

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