No. of Recommendations: 9
Most simply, health care consumption goes up. All the uninsured and underinsured people start consuming more health care. Yes, they currently get some treatment from unpaid visits to the ER or out of pocket or GoFundMe - but once they have insurance, they will consume more health care. We have to now pay for all that.
It's actually the opposite. When someone doesn't get the health care they need and their condition becomes critical, they end up at the ER, costing many times more. A doctor's visit to get a prescription to reduce high cholesterol or blood pressure is a hundred times cheaper than calling an ambulance to deliver that person to an ER for emergency heart surgery. Prescribing antibiotics for pneumonia at a doctor's office is ten times cheaper than doing the same at the ER. The savings from UHC are not only administrative. They directly impact the cost and efficacy of the health care itself.
