>>Not too hard to figure out why it's so expensive. The hospitals and insurers have made a devil's bargain.
>>A. I raise my already ridiculous prices and use that money to hire people like Michelle Obama who would have a hard time spelling Band Aid.
>>B. You, the insurer, pay me and then complain about it and raise your premiums and profits.
>>C. Back to A.

I can see it sticks in your craw, but tackling crony capitalism can leave both of us embittered and distracted! Besides, in this case you'd need 5000 Michelle Obamas to make a dent in the 40% admin share of hospital costs.

I appreciate your Faustian bargain label for insurers abdicating their natural price control function which incentivizes overcapacity justifying increased per encounter cost which increases the premiums and insurer share. Will you let me add in government providing billions in subsidies to disconnect end-user premiums from rising costs. When the house of cards comes down, what a crash there will be.

>>The MD's and nurses I know - and they are the caregivers- are not part of that deal.

I know. And MDs are turning into salaried workers to avoid all this angst. Result for the US public: If you like your doctor you can't keep her, because she's on nights or some other clinic so you get to meet whoever is rostered. Step backwards? Time will tell.

>>This is interrogative - not argumentative - are millions really going without care?
>>I know that millions are uninsured, but the ER here is often crowded with people getting care that they'll never pay for and Medicaid covers a lot of people.

CDC's calculation for 2016 is that 4.4% of people needing care, could not get it because of cost. This is the cause of the US coming last in the "Access" comparison with other Western nations, since 88% do have a usual place to go to receive care.

I always thought that the ACA's strong effect on Access would start to move your ratings. Immediately prior to ACA, 18% of US adults were without health cover. By Q4 2016 that was down to 10.8%. Unfortunately latest Gallup figures are that in Q1 2017 it's gone up, with 11.3% of adults without insurance. If that's a trend- and the death spiral says it is- then the gains are being undone as partisan politicians bicker, posture and fiddle as Rome burns. What a shame.