Feb 9, 6:53 PM
FLORIDA TODAY
Health care for all
Political cowardice is stunting the dialogue on solving the nation’s health-care crisis
Weapons of mass destruction haven’t turned up in Iraq, a potential time bomb for the presidential election. But another massive problem — call it a giant fragmentation bomb — is exploding in plain sight.
The issue is out-of-control health care costs, and though polls show Americans put it right up there with national security as a priority, politicians continue to run away from it.
More than 43 million Americans lack health-care coverage across the nation, including 70,000 in Brevard County. Many of them are employed by small businesses that can’t afford to offer benefits.
Employer health-care costs, up 32 percent since 2000, are predicted to rise by double digits for the next 5 years, meaning more businesses may drop health coverage.
That will add more to the ranks of the uninsured unless serious reform is addressed and soon.
Make no mistake, anyone can fall through the cracks as affordable coverage disappears. More than 100,000 Florida children are stuck on waiting lists for the state’s KidCare program for low-income families.
And, in 2003, dozens of elderly Brevardians who lacked insurance had to be turned away at the Embers, an adult-care facility in Cocoa, administrator Sandy Rutherford says.
That caused job disruptions for their children, just one example of ripples from lack of insurance spreading to families and communities.
Employers also hold back on hiring or use part-timers when health costs skyrocket — worsening the job market and continuing the uninsured spiral. Children without medical care don’t achieve as they should at school.
Those snowballing consequences are one reason a panel at the National Academy of Sciences recently called for universal health-care coverage for all Americans by 2010.
That’s a goal achieved by every other wealthy, industrialized nation and it’s time it deserves the most serious discussion in Washington, with input from citizens.
But politicians from across the spectrum shun that hot potato, preferring the Band-Aid approach when open-heart surgery is needed.
President Bush touts a mix of tax credits, health savings accounts, and letting small businesses join pools to bargain for better insurance rates. Those proposals are inadequate, and demonstrate the administration’s failure to grasp the breadth of the nation’s health-care crisis.
The remaining Democratic contenders for the White House really aren’t any better, dodging the politically perilous question of universal coverage.
Shame on them all for creeping around this important issue, letting fear of powerful insurance and medical lobbies drive out the possibility of confronting this issue the way it must be — head on.
This election year, the public must demand clear answers from both Republicans and Democrats about the future of health care in the nation, including why universal coverage by 2010 isn’t up for debate.