Dr. Adam Cunningham Discusses Medical Tourism

About this episode

Dr. Adam Cunningham discusses the challenges of medical tourism in the context of the unaffordable US healthcare system.

Listeners are all well aware US healthcare is increasingly unaffordable. Among other stats nearly 50% of Americas are either uninsured, at 8% or 27 million, or underinsured, at 41% or 120 million. Upwards of 4.8 million Americans are expected to drop their ACA coverage; the average commercial family plan comes w/a $6,800 annual premium and 42% of Americans are now enrolled in high-deductible commercial health plans. As a result 36% of all adults now skip or postpone medical care. Though I’ve likely previously cited, the Noble Prize-winning Princeton economist Angus Deaton concluded in 2020, the US healthcare industry, “is a cancer at the heart of the economy, one that has widely metastasized, bringing down wages, destroying good jobs and making it harder and harder for state and federal governments to afford what their constituents need. Public purpose and wellbeing of ordinary people are being subordinated to the private gain of the already well off. None of this would be possible without acquiescence – and sometimes enthusiastic participation – of the politicians who are supposed to act in the interest of the public.” This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this…

People in this episode

Host: David Introcaso

Guest: Dr. Adam Cunningham

Topics covered

• medical tourism
• healthcare affordability
• insurance coverage
• public health policy
• economic impact of healthcare

Keywords

• medical tourism
• healthcare costs
• insurance
• ACA coverage
• high-deductible plans
• public health
• economic impact

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Princeton

Places: United States

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