Review by Choice Review
One of the clearest books on its topic to date, this well-researched volume by Reid, a reporter for The Washington Post, investigates the US health care system. The author documents how, for the most important measures of health care coverage, cost, and quality, the US lags far behind the rest of the developed world. He then describes the four models of health care represented in the rest of the world's systems, hoping that the public and policy makers will find this information useful for the reform of the American system. When the author reports on suggestions for care for his own shoulder within a number of different health care systems, the book takes on a human-interest dimension. Well written and enjoyable to read, it also provides a wealth of important information from independent studies done on health care delivery systems. The author concludes that, while this debate has important political, economic, and medical dimensions, the most important aspect is the ethical one. Will people choose to recognize health care as a universal human right, or continue to deny coverage to millions of their fellow citizens? Summing Up: Highly recommended. All levels. C. L. Kammer The College of Wooster
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by New York Times Review
With all the hysteria over health care and the public option, it's high time for the facts behind buzzwords like "socialized medicine" and "death panels." Reid, a correspondent for The Washington Post, provides a lucid examination of health care around the world, and shows how the United States compares on coverage, cost, quality and choice. The results are humbling. In a humanizing twist, Reid details his own experiences as he tries to get treatment for a bum shoulder. At a $10 consultation in Versailles, he is told that he should have physical therapy but that he may choose surgery done by any doctor in France, on the national dime. In Japan he's offered a vast range of treatments. When he asks about shoulder reconstruction, he is told: "Tomorrow would be a little difficult. But next week would probably work." So much for national health care inevitably resulting in a lack of choice or endless waits. But not all the statistics and fun facts in "The Healing of America" are equally persuasive. Reid writes, for example, that "British women tend to have their babies at home; Japanese women, in contrast, almost always give birth in the hospital." Actually, home births account for less than 3 percent of births in each country. Still, this doesn't detract from Reid's conclusion that every advanced nation in the world has a cheaper and fairer health care system than we do. He deftly counters the notion that "American exceptionalism" prevents us from successfully adapting another country's system. Evidently, when it comes to health care, America is exceptional only in that it's a rich country with a poor country's approach to taking care of people.
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [October 27, 2009]
Review by Booklist Review
For all the rights and privileges enjoyed in the U.S, this country remains the only industrialized one that does not guarantee medical services to all its citizens. As a result, our health-care system ranks poorly when it comes to infant mortality, life expectancy, satisfaction, and overall performance. Reid traveled the globe to study the health-care systems of other democratic nations, such as France, Germany, Japan, the UK, and Canada, where medical services are available to every citizen. None of these systems are perfect, but he found that a single national health-care system is not only more efficient but also costs less, saves lives, and provides a better quality of care than the dysfunctional hodgepodge that we have in this country. Reid dispels the common fears about socialized medicine, waiting lists, and other myths disseminated by the lobbyists and politicians with a stake in the status quo. Here, we get a clear picture of why we have a moral imperative to implement a heath-care system for all Americans.--Siegfried, David Copyright 2009 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Washington Post correspondent Reid (The United States of Europe) explores health-care systems around the world in an effort to understand why the U.S. remains the only first world nation to refuse its citizens universal health care. Neither financial prudence nor concern for the commonweal explains the American position, according to Reid, whose findings divulge that the U.S. not only spends more money on health care than any other nation but also leaves 45 million residents uninsured, allowing about 22,000 to die from easily treatable diseases. Seeking treatment for the flareup of an old shoulder injury, he visits doctors in the U.S., France, Germany, Japan and England-with a stint in an Ayurvedic clinic in India-in a quest for treatment that dovetails with his search for a "cure" for America's health-care crisis, a narrative device that sometimes feels contrived, but allows him valuable firsthand experience. For all the scope of his research and his ability to mint neat rebuttals to the common American misconception that universal health care is "socialized" medicine, Reid neglects to address the elephant in the room: just how are we to sell these changes to the mighty providers and insurers? (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Even though the United States spends more on health care than any other nation, 20,000 Americans die each year as a result of having little or no health insurance. Washington Post correspondent Reid (The United States of Europe) surveys European and Asian systems that range from single payer to pay-as-you-go, describing how the systems evolved and enumerating their pros and cons. Refuting standard myths about European health care, he demonstrates that there is no monolithic "socialized medicine": most countries provide a basic health package paid for through nonprofit insurance, with supplemental private coverage also available. Reid makes a forceful case that if the United States makes a commitment to universal health care, these countries offer invaluable blueprints. Verdict Reid's concise-and surprisingly humorous-study is recommended to anyone following the ongoing debate over health-care reform.-Dick Maxwell, Porter Adventist Hosp. Lib., Denver (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
A timely surveyfilled with important lessons for the United Statesof how other nations have created systems that provide universal health care for their citizens. Washington Post correspondent and NPR commentator Reid (The United States of Europe: The New Superpower and the End of American Supremacy, 2004, etc.) sees the health-care issue as a moral question to which all other technologically developed countries have responded well, creating affordable, effective systems. The author outlines four basic models: the Bismarck, in which both health-care providers and payers are private; the Beveridge, in which "health care is provided and financed by the government, through tax payments"; the National Health Insurance (NHI) model, in which the providers are private but everyone pays into a government-run insurance program; and the out-of-pocket model, in which the patient pays with no insurance or government help. Elements of all four are present in the United States. The author took his own health problema stiff, painful shoulderto doctors in France, Germany and Japan to see how the Bismarck model worked; to Great Britain to assess the Beveridge model; to Canada to look at the NHI model; and to India, where the patient pays out of pocket. He also went to Switzerland and Taiwan, two countries that have recently reformed their health-care systems, to see how they accomplished major overhauls. Reid's personal experiences with doctors and hospitals make for entertaining readingespecially his encounter with Ayurvedic medicineand his stories of patients who have been unable to get necessary health care are moving. More important, these anecdotes are embedded in solid research. The author provides a capsule history of each system, discusses its drawbacks as well as benefits and destroys some popular myths about so-called socialized medicine. Though he offers many image-shattering statistics that reveal how poorly the United States stacks up against other countries, the author's message is essentially optimistic: We can learn from the experience of other countries and use that knowledge to create a more efficient and humane system. A reasoned, well-balanced, highly readable account, especially welcome as the national debate over health care gets underway. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
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