In this interview segment, Dennis Prager is asked about his perspective on American healthcare, drawing on his personal experience after a spinal cord injury that left him paralyzed. He explains that while the U.S. system provides acute hospital care, it offers little support for long‑term needs such as ongoing care and equipment, forcing patients to pay out‑of‑pocket once discharged. Prager criticizes the left’s tendency to compare U.S. healthcare to an idealized utopia rather than to actual foreign systems, arguing that such comparisons are misleading. He notes that the current system, rooted in policies from the 1970s, failed to anticipate survivable spinal‑cord injuries, leaving a gap in coverage. Prager also references his recent book, If There Is No God, mentions his wife Sue’s involvement in navigating paperwork, and hints at future efforts to report on healthcare reforms. The conversation reflects his free‑market conservative stance and his intent to use his platform to highlight what works and what doesn’t in American healthcare.
His brand new book is If There Is No God. It's in bookstores everywhere. It's at Amazon. It continues to sell like hotcakes. Dennis, I want to ask you a question. It's really more of a question for Sue, your wonderful and loving wife, but I want your answer. American healthcare gets a lot of critiques. You've been in it since your injury, a year and three quarters now. What do you make of American healthcare?
Well, that's a very tough question, uh, for me to answer because you have to compare American healthcare to healthcare elsewhere. I can't compare it to an ideal healthcare system. That's, that's what I, uh, that's what I argue against. The left about. They compare America to a utopia, not to other countries. So I would have to do the same with healthcare. But I can tell you this, with regard to what I have— spinal cord injury— there is nothing that, uh, The— there is very little that the system helps with. Once you're out of a hospital, you're on your own. You have to pay all out of pocket. And this is a very serious issue that my wife and I are addressing. Spinal cord injury means paralysis, which is my current state. Thank God I have my brain. Thank God. I mean, I've, I finished If There Is No God in the hospital paralyzed thanks to my dear friend Joel Alperson. So, uh, I'll give you a much better report a few months from now. But this is a very serious problem. People are left basically because it comes from the 1970s. They didn't include spinal cord injuries because people died then. But people don't die. I'm not dead.
So it's very much not that. And I doubt you're going to be dead for a long time. That's why, you know, I've had a couple of exchanges with Sue and I know how difficult paperwork is, but I think you will be in an excellent position as a free market conservative voice of influence to actually speak about what works and what doesn't work. Have you given any thought to doing that book?
On, on healthcare? Yeah, well, right now I have to finish my 5th volume of my commentary on the first 5 books of the Bible. I, I, I have Genesis, Exodus, Deuteronomy, and Numbers out, and now I'm finishing Leviticus, the toughest of the 5 books. So I can't, I can't worry about a healthcare book right now.
