Germanys Changing Health Care System essays

Germany's Changing Health Care System essays In 1949, when the occupying armies of the Allies left the region that had been the German nation, two states were created, Communist-bloc East Germany, and a western-friendly democracy, West Germany. In 1961, the East Germany government erected a wall in Berlin to keep East Germans from becoming West Germans. The wall, a hated symbol but also a real wedge into German culture and society, stood until 1989. Suddenly, in the spring and summer of that year, there was an exodus of East German citizens through embassies in Poland, Hungary and Czechoslovakia. In early October, there were unheard-of public demonstrations against the East German government in With the world watching on TV, on November 9, 1989, the citizens of East German and West Germany breached the Berlin wall, and changed Germanand even Europeansociety in far-reaching ways. Only twenty-one days later, on November 28, 1989, West German chancellor Helmut Kohl laid out a program to overcome another division, that between Germany and the A tacit quarantine of Germany, possibly because of the aggressive posturing of East Germany (GDR), had existed since the Second World War. On March 18, 1990, the first free elections were held in East Germany. The result was virtual unification of the East and West Germany. It was an event that would begin changes, startlingly enough, away from completely socialized medicine in West Germany and toward a more market- economy system. Despite its free market economy and democratic elections, West Germany had an enviable socialized heath care scheme. Historical basis of German healthcare Healthcare is regarded by sociologists as a social protection system.' Designing such systems has always been high on the political agenda in Europe; after World War II, during a period of high economic growth in which there was a relati...