In the discussion about health care the question has come up " is it a right or a privelege?" In the preamble to the Declaration of Indepence certain inalienable rights are mentioned such as liberty and the pursuit of happiness . Notice that it was decided by our founding fathers that these are rights and not priveleges,they are not granted by the powers that be but are rights,  natural and not alien. I would argue that when an ill person  is denied treatment which exists, but has been  made alien because of monetary considerations, that then liberty itself  is being withheld and the pursuit of happiness impeded.

 Some have argued that they shouldn't have to pay for someone elses insurance, that this imposes upon their own rights. They estimate that by law, those without insurance can not be denied "emergency" treatment , and that this should be enough. My response to that argument is this, emergency treatment incurs the same costs whether the person has insurance or not, so who pays that cost ? The answer is that the insured pay it as  inflated prices on their premiums, prescriptions, and procedures. So the insured are presently paying for the uninsured in hidden price surcharges and this by law. The insured should be the first and loudest calling for public health policy because right now they  pay the lions share of the cost of the uninsured .Public health insurance would spread the cost over a much larger pool and actually take the burden off their shoulders. Congress should have to take the same insurance as they win or lose, for the rest of us.

 Public health insurance "insures" that Liberty and the pursuit of happiness are not alien to any person. It is a horror that life and health ever became slaves to profit, and to argue for the present for profit system, now in the hands of merchants, is to argue against right and decency. Medical treatment belongs in the hands of physicians not in the hands accountants.

Furthermore, emergency treatment only addresses dire need and not longevity or quality of life, two seperate issues. Longevity of life is fulfilling the liberty to live while quality of life is fulfilling the pursuit of happiness during that life. Health Care addresses both.

Let me show you how longevity of life has changed over the centuries.

• During the Paleolithic era stone age mans life span averaged 33 years. Times were tough and predators were large.

•  During the Bronze Age the life span dropped to 18 years. One factor that could have assisted in that   drop was that  the ore used to make bronze naturally contained arsenic which would have been present in cooking, drinking and eating vessels. It could also be argued that the lighter,faster,sharper weapons made from metal helped men kill one another better,in fact this may be more of a factor than poisoning as seen in the fact that in Bronze Age Sweden the life span averaged about 40 to 60 years, much longer than comtemporaries, yes the Swedes always the peacenics forged their metal unto plowshares and not swords. 

• Surprisingly in Classical Greece and Classical Rome, high points in civilization,the average lifespan was only 20 to 30 years, amazing in the fact that it is lower than that of the stoneage man with all his difficulties? Historians present, can you expand on the reasons for this drop?

•  Here is an interesting fact, in the Medieval Islamic Califate the average lifespan was 35 years with a caveat, and that is if you were of the elite class the lifespan jumped up to  59 to 84.3 years in the Middle East and 69 to 75 in Islamic Spain.

• Early 20th century lifespan averaged from 30 to 40 years , present world average in 2008 is 70. A shocking fact that was found is that due to poverty, overcrowding, open sewage, lead in the water supply and the primative medical treatment ( unsanitary conditions, blood letting, and leeches to name a few) the life span in Europe dropped to 20 to 30 years, that is if you survived the critical first five years. The percentage of the children born in London during the pre industrial years who died before the age of five was 74.5%.  This was a period from about 1730 to 1749. Later, from 1810 to 1829 this death figure dropped to 31.8%

• So in this debate can it be argued that public health can contribute to lifespan? Consider the following, during the 20th century the average lifespan in the United States has increased by more than 30 years, and 25 of those years can be attributed to advances in public health.

 Public health contributes to longer life but I would argue that it is also capable of adding to quality. To give a person a longer life filled with chronic pain is to offer them  half life.  Life  lived and seen through the prism of pain  is a fractured vision of life. If by treatment that pain can be stopped or by medicine made less and bearable, then the quality of  that life is blessedly increased. To withhold this basic right to life and liberty in the quest for profit is inhumane, and denying our fellow man the minimum kindness we afford our pets.

Who then would argue against themselves and humanity by opposing public health insurance, who would campaign against the basic rights of liberty and the pursuit of happeness for all. For those who oppose for profit consider this while you scoff, nothing is free and  the money that will fill your treasure chest so adored, has the unbearable stench of death on it.

 All reference is from Wikipedia (lifespan)