This examining health inequities series is created as a part of being a student in Examining Health Inequities at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, where I am challenged to examine health inequities and provide my own opinion.
The United States of America has a culture built upon a philosophy and culture of competitiveness. As someone who has played and watched team sports my entire life, I have always been enamored by the idea of equality in sports. Every day there was an intrinsic belief by myself and my teammates that if you just work harder you will get better and you will win.
70% of people in the United States identify as either a casual or avid sports fan and the North American market for professional sports is approximately $80 Billion dollars. These two factors clearly indicate how much professional sports play a significant impact in the culture of the United States. Sports influence a lot of the beliefs of the average American. We live in a culture where competition is everything and incentives (typically financial) are tied to a competitive system. While I will always love the idea of equality in a sports atmosphere, there is a lot of danger in having a competition-oriented system in the world of healthcare.
80% of healthcare outcomes are determined by the community that an individual lives in; this is a recipe for disaster when viewed through a hyper-competitive system. A person living in Zip Code A may have access to a better school system compared to a person living in Zip Code B, automatically putting the person in Zip Code B at a competitive disadvantage. Unfortunately, a lot of the United States has been built upon scenarios just like this where wealthy and powerful organizations and people have been able to leverage these competitive advantages that have culminated in generational competitive advantages for specific communities. This system will continue to financially and socially benefit Zip Code A and hurt Zip Code B.
Healthcare inequities will only continue to be exploited through a system that is based around a competitive mindset where there has to be a winner. There needs to be an enhanced focus on creating a system that isn’t designed to compete, but instead to allow equal opportunity of achieving the same outcome for people regardless of what community they currently live in. With a GDP of over $20 trillion dollars, the majority of systems in the United States have incentives that are financially driven. In order to make real change that creates an equitable experience for all communities, there need to be local, state, and federal policies with clear financial incentives for organizations and communities that create more equitable opportunities for people, reframing what competition means for health and social care.
Erik Angus 