Though the glitz and glamor of campaign season has died down, I find myself drowning in heated banter regarding policy proposals. My efforts to make sense of the debates surrounding President Barack Obama’s planned health care bill seems to be a daunting task.

The proposed system’s chief principles are accessibility, affordability, and advancement in the general logistics of the health care system. These reforms are aimed at the needs of the struggling middle class.

In a nationwide television ad campaign, one organization, the Club for Growth, compares the planned system to that of the current British health care system. It alleges that the British system places monetary worth on a human life by placing a cap on the expenditure for an individual’s medical care.

In an Aug. 18 interview on National Public Radio, Britain’s National Health Service adviser Ara Darzi defended the European health care system.

“What you’re hearing is not just false and distasteful,” Darzi said.

Barbara O’Connor, communication studies professor, explains why people shy away from health care reform.

“[Health care] is such an emotional issue because people are frightened, especially in the state of the economy,” she said.

George Lakoff, writer of a recent perspective piece on the issue in independent news publication Truthout, said the vague and unfocused promotion of the health care proposal has been leaving the public to draw its own conclusions about the change to come.

Naturally, the public anticipated the worst.

Former President Bill Clinton’s 1993 health care bill was subject to the same flack after confidential and negatively suggestive proceedings were leaked to the public. The public’s support of his platform was thus compromised, causing the policy’s infrastructure to crumble.

This summer I turned 22. This one little year added to my age makes me ineligible as a dependent under my parents’ coverage. I could find a job that offers health benefits to part-time employees, or drown in hospital bills if something should happen to me.

I can only hope that a resolution is reached soon. Until then, the well-being of millions hangs in the balance.

[email protected]