According to several recent studies of health care systems across the globe, the U.S. health care system lags far behind those in other developed nations. The system is more expensive per person, but also for the nation as a whole. This high cost doesn't translate into good access, high quality, or favorable outcomes. Many in the nation have no insurance at all, and many can't find a primary care provider, or access much beyond basic emergency care. Our very expensive system does not do well at preventing death, either.

Skyrocketing insurance costs are likely to make matters worse, leaving more people uninsured, and dying for lack of care. It is likely to create a ripple effect, as high health care costs will increase food insecurity and exacerbate the homelessness crisis. These effects may even touch those who are comfortably well-off, as more care facilities close due to lack of funds.

Activists, lobbyists, policy-makers, and analysts have been calling for some form of universal care for Americans for decades, to bring us in line with the less expensive and more equitable systems in other nations. But what should Catholics think about this question? Would universal health care access be in line with Catholic social teaching? What would a truly just health care system look like?

This episode of Just Politics is a collaboration with the Glad You Asked podcast. Sister of the Humility of Mary Eilis McCulloh, one of the Just Politics hosts, talks here with U.S. Catholic editors Emily Sanna and Rebecca Bratten Weiss about Catholic teaching on health care. Glad You Asked brings in theologians, activists, scholars, and other experts to tackle a range of questions about Catholicism that don't have easy, obvious answers.

You can learn more about this topic in these links:

International Comparison of Health Systems

How does the quality of the U.S. health system compare to other countries?

Mirror, Mirror 2024: A Portrait of the Failing U.S. Health System

"Kristen Whitney Daniels on why health care access is a matter of faith and justice," Just Politics

"As the inauguration approaches, U.S. health care is on the line," by Kevin Clarke

Glad You Asked is sponsored by the Claretian Missionaries USA, a congregation of Catholic priests and brothers who live and work with the most vulnerable among us. To learn more, visit claretians.org.