The Healthcare Industry Exposed

Healthcare is the general term used for the entire area of prevention, intervention and cure of sickness and disease using the facilities of medical professionals and resources. Still, The World Health Organization believes the meaning should also incorporate all associated industries and be a service available to everyone irrespective of who they, which means people as well as whole groups of people. The organized provision of such facilities may constitute a health care system.

Early before the phrase healthcare was common, the English speaking countries called it just plain medicine or more usually the health sector but it still meant the provision of a health service to treat and cure illness and disease. Most developed and even developing nations have a system of healthcare for all to cater for those who cannot pay. This first started in the United Kingdom a few years after the end of World War 2 in 1948, and became the first health care service set up and run by a government.

According to The WHO, a good alternative to this system is that in Italy where insurance for health is a compulsory but is a government funded service and possibly the second best around the world. Other examples are Medicare in Australia, established in the 1970s by the Labor administration, and by the same name Medicare in Canada, established between almost twenty and 1984. The main nations that do not support this universal healthcare service are America and South Africa, although they are making reforms to their health service. healthcare professionals are dedicated to preventing illness and disease primarily, but also to treat and protect the long term health of their patients.

The healthcare industry is one of the world's largest and fastest-growing industries generally consuming at least 10 percent of gross domestic product of most developed countries, healthcare can form an enormous part of a country's economy. The United States bucks this trend with, back in 2003, a health industry responsible or over 15 percent of gross domestic product but this is anticipated to rise considerably by 2016 when it will almost one fifth of The United States GDP.

In The United States there are one hundred eighty million Americans who want healthcare and a recent study showed that it was the number one concern of those seeking work. A problem which came to a head when General Motors was seriously considering bankruptcy over the strain its health car program was putting on the company. As luck would have it, negotiations between the Union and GM management made a deal to reduce some of the benefits but keep operating as usual but the were force to sell off their under performing finance arm GMAC.

Healthcare has become an extremely important issue to Americans one which employers must address to a work force which demands better healthcare benefits. Perhaps it is time healthcare was looked at in a different way and perhaps called health preservation with an emphasis on fitness and health to ease the need for a top heavy health care system which is becoming a global issue.