Debate teams talk healthcare

With a fake dismembered hand and fake heart on the podium, students from the IU Debate Team debated members from the British National Debate team on Wednesday
night.

Both debate teams are members of SID, an organization that partners U.S. teams with the British team, said Director of Debate for IU Brian DeLong. Teams must purchase the opportunity to debate the British team.

“As a team, we decided that health care was a major issue,” DeLong said. “We might be able to see through some of the discourse of socialism that was attached to the Affordable Care Act.”

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, proposed by President Barack Obama, will provide health care coverage to more than 94 percent of Americans.  The act is supposed to take full effect in 2014.

The debate focused on the health care systems in the U.S. and United Kingdom, with the debaters representing their respective countries.

Each team used research to support its major arguments. The opposing team was given the opportunity to cross examine.

Willard Foxton, British National Debate team member and graduate of the University of the West of England, initiated the debate with a description of the National Health Service in the U.K.

“In 1945, National Healthcare Service, a comprehensive health care, was enacted,” Foxton said. “It affected everyone. It was 100 percent access to all.”
The NHS gave free health care in the U.K., with few exceptions.

Sam Owens, a senior on the IU Debate Team, said purchasing health insurance helps lower costs in the long run.

The U.S. has the most expensive health care system in the world, Foxton said.

“About 50 million people aren’t covered,” Foxton said. “A vast amount of people aren’t covered for what they need. You can spend less money and have everyone in the country covered. It’s better for the state, theoretically.”

Owens said the U.S. health care system allows for innovation in pharmaceuticals and medical technology.

Ettie Bailey-King, British National Debate Team member and graduate of Durham University, said the U.S. health care system hinders innovation.

“People staying in jobs for 10, 20, 30 years that have health care,” Bailey-King said.
“That’s why people are staying in jobs. Even if there are efficiencies, it works out to a potential where they are more recognized in the U.K.”

IU Debate Team member and freshman Bobby Ingram said the government would not be able to take on the health care system and lower the citizens’ burden.
Bailey-King said health care is a moral choice.

“Your choice is hugely inflected by your health care,” she said. “The only thing state can do to ensure everyone has opportunity and potential is to catch it when it occurs at the very beginning. We realize there is an ethical imperative to keep the people safe.”

The debate team members do not necessarily share views presented, DeLong said.

“Our goal was just to spread sort of awareness about health issues and health care issues specifically,” Owens said. “Hopefully we did spread some education about the difference between the U.S. and U.K. systems and cleared up many exceptions people may have had.”

Bailey-King said she also hoped the debate helped spread information about health care.

“I hope that we opened a lot of people’s minds to the idea of doing things differently and informed people about how we do health care in the U.K.,” she said.