Healthcare reform will once again be coming to the forefront on February 25 when the President calls leaders from both parties for a healthcare summit. The summit is a half-day meeting to solve the problems in healthcare that have persisted for decades. The President will once again explain his plans for healthcare reform, after having apologized and accepted responsibility for not “explaining it more clearly to the American people.”
The President has already given 29 speeches explaining his party’s plans for healthcare reform. The problem is not that the public does not understand the Senate or House proposals. The public understands the proposals all too well: a government takeover of healthcare with a price tag of $2.5 trillion over 10 years, giant slashes to the already under-funded Medicare, expansion of Medicaid, huge tax increases that would cost an estimated five million American jobs and stifle medical innovation, and individual mandates to purchase government-approved insurance plans just to name a few. The American people understand these proposals and have soundly rejected them, as evidenced by the recent election in Massachusetts.
America is desperately in need of healthcare reform. I have yet to meet a person who opposes the idea of healthcare reform. The status quo is not a sustainable path. But the reform we enact must be responsible and must maintain the quality and availability of care and the sanctity of the doctor-patient relationship. Such responsible reform would include the following:
- Tort reform.
- Eliminate the restrictions on the interstate sale of health insurance to increase competition among insurance companies and decrease the cost of insurance.
- Make insurance portable. You should not lose your insurance if you lose or change jobs.
- Give the same tax breaks to individuals in the form of tax credits or deductions as are given to employers. This will make insurance more affordable.
- Encourage health savings accounts. If you really want to control health care costs, this must be done.
- Establish state-wide high-risk pools so that those with preexisting conditions can get insurance at reasonable rates.
Enacting these six points would not cost a dime, but it would maintain the quality and availability of care, and maximize the availability of affordable health insurance.
The partisan divide in Washington on healthcare reform is discouraging to everyone, particularly physicians. Physicians do not treat democrats or republicans, we treat patients. Our desire and, in fact, our responsibility is to protect the welfare of our patients, which means maintaining the quality and availability of care. The American people should demand no less of their elected representatives.
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