Udow-Phillips offers perspective as China Global Television examines U.S. health system amid coronavirus
Lending context to China Global Television Network’s (CGTN) scrutiny of the U.S health system’s response to the coronavirus crisis, CHRT Executive Director Marianne Udow-Phillips explains that lack of health coverage is “…a huge concern in the middle of coronavirus, because this is a pandemic, it doesn’t hit just people who are insured.”
The story looks at U.S. health system policy issues around the Affordable Care Act and considers how some policies can lead to varying pandemic responses at different levels of government. “There is no central entity in the U.S. which makes policy decisions for the whole health care system,” says Udow-Phillips. “Sometimes we have decisions made at the federal level which might conflict with decisions made at the state or local level.”
CGTN goes on to question whether the federal response to the pandemic occurred early enough and was adequate, and Udow-Phillips provides some historical context for the U.S. government’s approach. “One of the reasons we’re seeing this huge spike in cases is we were not prepared,” Udow-Phillips said. “Underfunding of public health is a longstanding problem.”