Yesterday, the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee passed a health reform plan that includes a public option. Meanwhile, on the House side, Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) rolled out “a bill worth fighting for.” Republican Congressman Peter Hoekstra predicted that Congress will soon pass a comprehensive health reform bill.
Fearing that health reform is getting closer to passage, the right-wing is escalating its rhetoric by issuing dire warnings of its consequences. Interviewed by the Washington Times, Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) was asked if “government-run health care” will “end up killing more people than it saves?” Coburn responded, “Absolutely.”
A couple of right-wing congressman voiced similar doom-and-gloom rhetoric on the House floor yesterday:
Rep. Steve King (R-IA): “They’re going to save money by rationing care, getting you in a long line. Places like Canada, United Kingdom, and Europe. People die when they’re in line.”
Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX): “One in five people have to die because they went to socialized medicine! … I would hate to think that among five women, one of ‘em is gonna die because we go to socialized care.”
“Many Americans are under the delusion that we have ‘the best health care system in the world,’” the New York Times editorial page wrote in 2007, but “the disturbing truth is that this country lags well behind other advanced nations in delivering timely and effective care.”
Compared with Australia, Canada, Germany, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom, the United States ranks last in all dimensions of a high performance health system: quality, access, efficiency, equity, and healthy lives. The United States currently ranks 50th out of 224 nations in life expectancy, with an average life span of 78.1 years, according to 2009 estimates from the CIA World Factbook.
Canada, Great Britain, and many of the other countries that the right-wing enjoys beating up on actually like their health systems and wouldn’t want to trade places with an American. Moreover, Americans don’t get a good bang for our buck. A Business Roundtable study found that compared to France, Germany, Japan, and the United Kingdom, U.S. workers and employers receive 23 percent less value from our health care system than the citizens of these other nations.
And, as the chart below shows, the U.S. spends the most per person on health care, but actually has worst life expectancies than many countries which spend less.
"American Medical Association backs House health bill" by Sandra Maler, Reuters
The influential American Medical Association on Thursday said it supported the healthcare overhaul legislation moving through committees in the Democratic-led House of Representatives and urged its approval.
"This legislation includes a broad range of provisions that are key to effective, comprehensive health system reform," AMA executive vice president Michael Maves wrote to the House committee leaders.
In particular, he said, the doctors' group backs the insurance market reforms that seek to expand healthcare coverage and the proposed health insurance exchange. In this exchange consumers would choose between private insurers and a public plan.
He also cited the ban on exclusion from coverage for pre-existing conditions and an increased reliance on primary care doctors.
On federal healthcare programs, the AMA said it welcomed the changes in Medicare health care for the elderly which would include a repeal of the sustainable growth rate formula and the expansion of Medicaid for the poor.
"This year, the AMA wants the debate in Washington to conclude with real, long overdue results that will improve the health of America's patients," he wrote.
"GOP Lawmaker Admits Congress Will Pass Democratic Health Care Bill" by Sam Stein, Huffington Post
A Democratic-endorsed health care bill will pass both the House of Representatives and the Senate this month, one of the White House's main Republican critics in Congress acknowledged on Thursday morning.
In an appearance on MSNBC lamenting the type of health care legislation currently being pushed by Democrats in the House, Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R-Mich.) made an admission that seems to go against the current conventional wisdom.
"We'll get [a health care bill] through the House and Senate this month," he said, defying the usual predictions heard from leading Republicans or skeptical Democrats. Hoekstra would add that it is unlikely that legislators would be able to have a bill on the president's desk before the August recess. But the White House's own timetable doesn't call for that.
"We've known for years that we were going to reach this fork in the road where we were either going to reform health care, we were going to provide more options to individuals, more affordable options for individuals to choose their health care, or we were going to create a government-run health care where the government would be making those decisions for us," Hoekstra said. "President Obama, the Democrats in the House and the Senate, have clearly chosen the government-run option. That is why they're in such a hurry to move this program through the House, through the Senate, and get it to his desk."
Hoekstra's admission that the two chambers of Congress are likely to pass their respective health care bills within the next month is one of the few times that a lawmaker has pulled back the curtain to reveal exactly where the legislative process currently stands. Passage in the House and Senate would set the stage for reconciling the separate bills in conference committee once the August recess is over.
One of the options at the president's hand is the bill recently unveiled by the House, which has become the preference for progressives. That approach won a major endorsement from The New York Times editorial page on Thursday.
While the Senate continues to struggle over its approach to health care reform, House Democratic leaders have unveiled a bill that would go a long way toward solving the nation's health insurance problems without driving up the deficit. It is already drawing fierce opposition from business groups and many Republicans. This is a bill worth fighting for.
The bill would require virtually all Americans to carry health insurance or pay a penalty. And it would require all but the smallest businesses to provide health insurance for their workers or pay a substantial fee. It would also expand Medicaid to cover many more poor people, and it would create new exchanges through which millions of middle-class Americans could buy health insurance with the help of government subsidies. The result would be near-universal coverage at a surprisingly manageable cost to the federal government.
The GOP is still promoting any healthcare reform as "government run health care" even thought (if you read the bills) if you like your current private healthcare provider you can select to keep it.
The "public option" is nothing more than another Healthcare Provider. They would operate just like any Private Healthcare Provider, but be a competitor.
It IS the competition that the private industry and the GOP fears, because in their heart-of-hearts they know the present system is committing highway robbery while at the same time keeping health care out of reach of many Americans. And you do NOT have "choice" if you cannot afford it.
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