ABSTRACT
The Health Maintenance Organization (HMO) Act of 1973 marked the beginnings of the privatized health-care industry in the United States. Before that, health-care service providers were not-for-profit. The Patent and Trademark Law Amendments Act of 1980 gave the private health-care industry control over the patents resulting from publicly funded research. Health-care spending has increased by 3,000% since 1970, with America spending on average two times more than any other industrialized nation. The health-care industry argues that the profit motive is essential to producing miracles of modern medicine: Perhaps our faith in miracles has undermined the fundamental concept of a public health-care system. This chapter examines how the privatized health-care system has impacted our ability to address major public health concerns evidenced by the COVID-19 pandemic.
