whenever anyone casts doubt on the idea that healthcare (or pharma) could be cheaper (and implicitly that the tradeoffs would be worth it) my simple response is: then please tell me how does every other western nation accomplish it? overall healthcare goals are met and for less money (in aggregate and individually) all around the world. in which way is america exceptional except insofar as exactly that here business tries to extract as much as value as physically possible. invariably someone will say something like "wait times" but it never pans out (just yesterday i was looking for data on this and it's simply inconclusive).