America’s Tens of Millions of Uninsured Citizens Has Terrible Consequences, Both Moral and Practical

From ex-Labor Secretary Robert Reich, writing about the meme here:

A teenager has died from coronavirus after being denied treatment. The teen sought help at an urgent care facility, but was turned away because he didn’t have health insurance. They suggested he try a local public hospital. He died the same day. My heart goes out to this child’s friends and family. I am sick and tired of writing about the broken health care system in America. The unbridled greed of health insurance companies has killed millions. We can, and we must, make health care a universal right in this country.

Our failure to provide healthcare to all U.S. citizens, carrying with it our consequent willingness to let people die of treatable diseases, has a variety of appalling consequences.  The horror story above is a moral tragedy, but it speaks to a practical one, given the context of the coronavirus, which is ripping through the U.S. population, largely as a result of our vile healthcare policy.