box of Jack

Wow. This movie may be Michael Moore’s most important work to date. If you haven’t heard, Michael Moore’s SiCKO is a movie that examines America’s market-driven health insurance system and the glaring lack of universal health care that the majority of other developed nations provide.

Let’s get my pre-existing biases out of the way:

1. I like paying taxes that provide health care to whomever needs it
2. I am only slightly cynical about Michael Moore
3. I don’t like health insurance companies and am frightened of the idea of HMO’s

Ok, this post is going to be full of spoilers, my reasoning is that people (more specifically, Americans) should be thinking about health care on a national level. If Michael Moore doesn’t like me revealing his entire movie in my blog then he is welcome to stand outside my apartment with all the people I’ve hurt and yell at me with a megaphone. So be warned, this is more of a synopsis with a subtle review hiding underneath.

The Uninsured

First, he starts off with introducing America’s uninsured. I’ve read about them from other (more reputable) sources before and I believe that these people are fucked. The film opens with a guy sewing his own stitches for a nasty but superficial-looking wound on his knee. I’ve heard of guys that just let their teeth rot and then pull it out with a pair of pliers.

Middle Class

Then we turn to people that are insured. Happy people living the American dream except that they got sick and the insurance companies weaseled their way out of it. We’ve all heard how insurance companies deny people on technicalities, regardless of whether it’s home, car, business, health or life insurance. This is the same old fodder you see in things like A Current Affair: decent human beings getting screwed by faceless corporations. It sucks and it makes you sit up because you too are middle-class and have parents and children to look after.

Corruption

Next stop is corruption. The idea is that all of this goes on because the government allows, facilitates and encourages it. Lobbyists, campaign contributions and funds that promise to improve health care but really only improve stock prices. Again, it’s an old story but fun for those people that did not get to experience the Nixon administration because you get to boo and hiss at the screen.

It gets a little sticky because he celebrates Hillary Clinton as a champion of “socialized medicine” back when she was the First Lady. She’s currently a presidential hopeful so it starts to feel like we’re being fed a pro-Democrat agenda. Luckily, Moore reveals that she got shutdown by lobbyists and other politicians and she’s getting paid for her silence so maybe that’s enough to calm Hillary haters.

Countries That America Likes

Moore then takes us across the border to Canada and around the globe to England. We get to see a single mother who was previously diagnosed with cancer. She drives across the border and pretends to be Canadian so she can get cheap health care. We also get to meet some other people who are in love with the Canadian system.

In England, it’s the same story. A glamorous (and most likely glamorized) view of their hospital system. Drugs are cheap, treatment is free and the government even reimburses your transport costs if you are poor enough. There’s also a bit about an English doctor who works for the government but still makes enough money to drive a nice car and live in a nice apartment so you don’t think that smart, educated people get fucked over by working for the government.

Moore also raises the important point that while critics love to paint universal health care as a precursor to socialism, things like the fire department, schools, postal service and libraries are already socialized. Introducing universal health care might not necessarily mean a widespread upheaval of political ideals.

Tony Benn

My favorite part of this film was all the bits with former English politician Tony Benn who talks about the establishment of the National Health Service in amidst the smoldering ruins of post-WW2 Britain. He asks how “if you can have full employment by killing Germans, then why can’t you have full employment by building hospitals”?

Benn goes on to equate NHS to women’s suffrage (bonus link); his country believes that both are fundamental to a developed nation and to suggest removing either of them would be a giant step backwards into the dark ages. He suggests that the root cause of why the NHS was instituted is democracy; the shift of power “from the wallet, to the ballot” meant health care for all. This all feels like a challenge to Americans for whom democracy is #2 on their list of things that they blindly love but fail to understand (#1 on the list is freedom of speech). (Zing! :D)

Benn’s reasoning on why the American democracy has failed to provide adequate health care is that there is an abundance of choice but a lack of freedom of choice. He believes “an educated, healthy and confident nation is harder to govern” and it’s fear and debt that is stopping people from voting, “hopeless people don’t vote.”

Countries That America Hates: France

Next stop: France. I’ve read about the French health care system before: it was a story about how a pregnant American was on vacation there and needed her baby delivered and in France you’ve got a guaranteed hospital stay of a few days and she kept wanting to leave because she was worried about the cost (it was all free, naturally).

If you thought Canada or England was glamorized, Moore really lays it on thick here. We see French people being skinny and living longer, we see a French guy get 3 months of paid sick leave with photos of his vacation in the south of France and we see a bunch of American ex-pats who actually feel guilty for having it so much better than the Americans.

Supposedly French people get free 24-hour house calls from doctors, mandated 35-hour weeks, unlimited sick days, 5-week per year minimum vacation, excellent daycare for their kids at $1 (or maybe €1?) per day, free college education and they have free nannies come to help new mothers with advice, laundry and cooking. While it’s all very impressive, it does kind of feel like socialist propaganda after a while.

Thankfully, Moore points the finger at democracy for instigating these amazing services. He says that it’s the smart, politically-active people that hold their government accountable. (I’m so proud of democracy that I just want to fire a gun into the air.)

Countries That America Hates: Cuba

Next, we go back in time to 9/11. There were rescue volunteers at Ground Zero who risked their lives and are now suffering with things like respiratory illness, post-traumatic stress and, of course, massive debt. In direct contrast, terrorists detained in Guantanamo Bay get amazing medical care (I assume because the whole world is watching and if someone were mistreated then the US Government would actually have to account for their actions).

Moore takes us to Cuba, one of the last bastions of communism, and makes a big show out of sitting in the middle of Guantanamo Bay with his very sick 9/11 rescue workers and yelling at a distant guard tower with a megaphone. In the next few scenes, we see how Cuba (a country that Americans understand to be pretty crappy) has amazing health care and treats all these people for free. One particularly moving scene when one of the rescue workers is told that one of her US$120.00 inhalers costs 3.20 pesos here. It’s a huge slap in the face for her.

To end the movie on a high note, we see everyone getting treatment in Cuba. We see the rescue workers being honored by a local fire station. Moore even tells a little story about how he sent an anonymous check to cover the medical expenses of someone who runs an anti-Moore website.

Thoughts

This movie is not a documentary. I’ve seen documentaries, they tell you shit like “the baboons mate continuously throughout the spring” or “the government launched an official inquiry”. The film is almost entirely comprised of human interest stories.

This movie is not objective, Michael Moore does not play the game that way. There’s a lot of pandering towards the American audience, there’s a bunch of superficial grandstanding, a whole truckload of sap and the contrasts between the health system are a bit overdone.

Overall though, I do think the movie makes a good point. While Moore may be a jackass, I believe his reasons are altruistic. The film does stray into some partisanship with its discussion of Hillary Clinton and its criticisms of the Bush government but for the most part, it’s a movie aimed at both sides of the political fence. I firmly believe that this is a cause worth championing and a movie worth seeing so make sure you catch this one, even if you’re not American.