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How Does John Q Health Care Reform

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John Q directed by Nick Cassavetes, is a film that came out in February 2002 that strongly argued for Healthcare reform in an era when it was not widely discussed. John Q follows the story of John Quincy Archibald a black middle-aged impoverished factory worker and his son, Michael, who had an enlarged heart and requires a heart transplant. The next hour of the film is spent battling Archibald’s hospital, insurance company, and government as he struggles desperately to get his son a heart despite his low income. And this war John Archibald is waging seems to be lost one until he dons the name “John Q” and takes an entire hospital and health system hostage. His terms, free healthcare for all: for his son, for his hostages, for his country, no more bureaucratic red tape between the people and healthcare. While Denzel Washington’s fictitious character does …show more content…

1 in the box office in its first weekend but it received mostly negative reviews amongst Rotten Tomatoes, IMDB, New York Times, and TIME magazine, despite receiving overwhelmingly positive reviews from the American populace. Critics argued that heart transplants are not regulated by cost and anyone can be placed on the transplant list if necessary, insurance companies do not work on annual caps but rather lifetime caps of around one million dollars, and the actual cost of heart transplant as of today without insurance average is 787,000 dollars not 250,000 but it is usually mostly covered by any insurance policy [Jeffrey Kruger, 2002], but that is aside the point. John Q’s controversy truly results from the questions it inspires: Could this story happen anywhere else? Could health care reform truly fix this issue? Did John Q’s race factor into the overall plot? Why has this not happened in reality? John Q poses as an excellent case study for the researcher looking to understand the state of American Healthcare today and will serve as the platform for this

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