The Pros And Cons Of Healthcare Accessibility

Healthcare Accessibility Medical and law organizations combine to create systemic racism. Systemic racism is numerous systems working together to put demographics of people at a disadvantage. One of these systems is the healthcare industry. It puts low-income people at a very big disadvantage as it has gotten so expensive. One trip to the hospital can put a family behind for months. It is also getting harder to get quality healthcare insurance for a good price meaning the number of uninsured people in the United States rises everyday. Even with insurance most lower income families cannot afford a trip to the hospital. Many factors go into how accessible healthcare is for a person including race, income, social pressures, where you live,

Medical accessibility has been a problem for a long time and many laws/acts have been passed in attempt to help this problem but, “[a]n estimated 43 million people (1 in 6 Americans) live in federally designated underserved areas and lack access to a private primary care provider” (Lefkowitz and Todd). “In 1998, 8.7 million people, one fifth of the 43 million, were served by health centers”(John, Smith, and JH Bloomberg School of Public Health). Not only is healthcare unaccessible but so is insurance. In fact, “[t]he number of uninsured patients in health centers has increased by nearly 60 percent since 1990, from 2.2 million to more than 3.5 million in 1998, representing about 8 percent of the nation’s 44.3 million uninsured” (John, Smith, and JH Bloomberg School of Public Health), Census Bureau). Within that group of uninsured people “Hispanic Americans

“[I]ncarcerated people often avoid seeking care because out-of-pocket copays can strain families with limited financial resources and saddle them with medical debt. For many incarcerated people, that financial risk—on top of the risk of mistreatment and verbal abuse that often accompanies an infirmary visit—is more than enough to deter them from making a sick call” (Cecile Joan). People in jail can work but they definitely do not make enough to see a doctor. Close proximity can also lead to breakouts of illnesses. If someone in your jail gets sick, you will probably get sick too because everybody interacts with at least one other person in the jail, spreading illnesses a lot faster than out in the world. “Incarceration is linked to health disparities among African American people, through both the disproportionate number of African American people who are imprisoned and, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the inability to social distance in a prison or jail setting” (Sarah B Maness PhD). It is specifically linked to African American people because of how disproportionately they are arrested compared to white