April 22, 2002
Steve Scully interviewing Dr. Henry Simmons, President, National Coalition on Health Care:
Steve Scully: An e-mail form Don McCanne, who is a medical doctor and president of an organization called Physicians for a National Health Program: “Isn’t it time to include the single payer model in the debates on reform?”
Dr. Henry Simmons: Oh, I think it’s time to discuss a fair number of propositions. In fact, in Roll Call today, Morton Kondracke, the editor, made exactly that point. There are not a whole lot of different options available to this country to deal with this problem. There are some, and we’ve got to examine them all and see which one makes sense for us given the circumstance we find ourselves in now.
Roll Call April 22, 2002 Partial Fixes Won’t Solve Crisis In Health Care Costs By Morton M. Kondracke
Surging health costs and insurance premiums – and increases in the number of uninsured Americans sure to follow – cry out for Washington politicians to begin thinking comprehensively about America’s impending health care crisis.
One of these days, they will – ideally, as part of the 2004 election campaign. But for now, they are taking only piecemeal whacks at the problem.
Sometimes incrementalism in Washington produces good results, such as creation of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program that widened Medicaid benefits for lower-income families.
But often it simply results in efforts by one group in the health care industry – say, doctors or hospitals – to get the upper hand over another, such as pharmaceutical or insurance companies.
(Kondracke discusses competing interests and then the CalPERS premium increases.)
Even CalPERS, which theoretically has huge bargaining power with health insurers and providers, has been unable to hold down costs. Most employers lack that power.
So CalPERS has joined the National Coalition on Health Care in urging a new comprehensive look at the health crisis – the first since the ill-fated 1993 Clinton health care plan. The group comprises business, labor, consumer and religious groups, and large-state pension plans.
President Henry Simmons says the group has no plan of its own, but that debate should start over three basic models. One is “play or pay,” in which employers continue to provide most insurance coverage and would receive government help if they can’t do so.
A second, favored by liberals during the 1993 debate, is a single-payer system in which all citizens would get their health insurance from Medicare or another government program.
The third, proposed by some Republicans, would impose an individual requirement on all citizens to have health insurance and offer government subsidies to those who can’t afford it.
Democratic presidential contenders need to be heard on this issue soon, and they should pressure President Bush to be heard, too.
National Coalition on Health Care: