Dentistry is not a specialization of medicine, because if it were the dentist would be required to go through a full medical doctor education including hospital residency and then become a dentist on top of this, so it wouldn’t benefit the consumer in that the current policy is fine and actually it might make more sense to break other specializations off from medicine so that you can get more affordable treatments from people with specialized skills without needing an entire set of generalized skills.
Regarding funding, I agree that preventative care should be covered under health insurance like physical exams, because if you go for a cleaning twice a year you probably aren’t going to have many problems and if you don’t go for a cleaning twice a year you probably are going to have a lot of problems. But many dental treatments are cosmetic in nature and not medically necessary and probably would not be covered under the current health insurance regime in the United States, but are covered under the dental insurance regime. It’s important to note that dental coverage in the US is widely available as a separate part of “Obamacare” subsidized by the government and children’s coverage on the marketplace is even stronger without waiting periods and limits on max out of pockets in a way that is generous compared to most private offerings.
Regarding funding, I agree that preventative care should be covered under health insurance like physical exams, because if you go for a cleaning twice a year you probably aren’t going to have many problems and if you don’t go for a cleaning twice a year you probably are going to have a lot of problems. But many dental treatments are cosmetic in nature and not medically necessary and probably would not be covered under the current health insurance regime in the United States, but are covered under the dental insurance regime. It’s important to note that dental coverage in the US is widely available as a separate part of “Obamacare” subsidized by the government and children’s coverage on the marketplace is even stronger without waiting periods and limits on max out of pockets in a way that is generous compared to most private offerings.