Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Health care is a hot topic even in high school
As adulthood approaches, teens know the issue will have an effect on their future.
Scott Bledsoe, a freshman at Hidden Valley High School, spent a Saturday this fall a little differently than most teens.
Waking up at 5 in the morning, he boarded a bus for the ride to Washington, D.C. In the midst of thousands of people crowding the National Mall on Sept. 12 for a rally, he listened to numerous journalists, politicians and writers speak about different issues facing the nation.
One of the most important topics of the rally was health care.
Health care is a major issue these days, and it's hard to turn on the news or even open a newspaper without hearing or reading something about it.
Amid the many opposing viewpoints and ideas on health care, the one thing that most people can agree on is that the current health care system needs changes.
"I think everyone agrees that the pre-existing conditions need to be taken out and that health care needs to be made affordable again," said Zach Brenton, a Hidden Valley High School senior.
"Personally, I'm against the national government doing it, because I think it increases the role of the federal government."
This brings up the main question in the debate, which is whether state governments should handle health care, or whether the U.S. should go with the "public option," which is a new term that means the federal government will be running or have an increased role in health care. Whatever the outcome, it will without a doubt affect American teens.
"We discuss it often," said Peggy Fleming, who teaches current affairs at Hidden Valley.
"[It's important for teenagers to be concerned about health care] because you're going to be paying for your own health care soon, and it's expensive now and could get even worse in the future.
"What I would like to see is for the congressional representatives and the senators to start working together and come up with something that's viable, that's not going to cost us a lot of money, but will actually improve health care in this nation, because we have too many people who are dying unnecessarily because they can't afford good insurance," Fleming said.
Brenton said, "No matter which way health care goes, it's important to voice concerns because this is inevitably going to affect us."
