Living in France, le blog

Throughout the health care reform debate currently raging in the United States, parties on all sides have made regular, oblique references to the French health care system, framing it as either a pinnacle of progress or a dire cautionary tale. The problem seems to be that these references, ranging from Michael Moore's glossy and biased homage in Sicko to Rush Limbaugh's equation of French health care with French inadequacy in World War II, are never based on any real assessment of the system. As an American who has lived under and sought care from both systems, I thought it might be useful for people to read an unbiased, factual account of how health care here actually works. While I have my opinions on the subject—after all, you know what they say about opinions—for this post I will keep my politics to myself and stick to the facts as I have lived them.