Health care reform seems to be a big topic these days. It is very divisive and raising a lot of blood pressure. For the record let me express my opinion. I have not read the existing bill but there are two fundamental problems with it that makes me opposed!
1. Our national debt and economy. For some reason our leaders in Washington believe we can continue to go into debt and it will be OK. Because this bill, introduces a trillion dollars in new debt, I consider it living beyond our means. We should not continue to go into debt for a new health care program. Bush has put us in a very bad financial position, but like it or not our financial situation is now Obama's problem.
2. Governments job is to set laws and be the referee it is not good to allow the referee to own one of the teams. No other teams will get a fair shake. Why can't we have a regulated system that does not include allowing the Federal Government a large stake in private enterprise.
Do not assume I believe health care is what it should be. The latest numbers show that health care is about 16% of our gross domestic product and it seems to be increasing at a faster rate than the growth of our economy. Does something need to be done? Yes there is no question about it, something needs to be done.
Washington needs to, through regulation, change the rules and allow the free market to handle it. Here are some thoughts that I have read or thought of.
1. Tort Reform, If a patient sues a doctor without a good cause and it is thrown out of the courts, the patient should be charged a significant fee to offset the damage to the doctors insurance premium as well as clogging our judicial system.
2. Allow nurses and physicians assistants to open their own clinics. Most doctors visits are sore throats, flu or broken bones. There is no reason to pay expensive doctor fees when a less expensive qualified individual could care for us.
3. Increase, by law, the number of students that are able to go through medical school and potentially become medical practitioners. Lets increase the number of doctors to put downward pressure on the price of the medical care.
4. Lets regulate the insurance companies to encourage a public option of private insurance.
My last point is this. Why do I feel like we are so pressured into getting this new program into place. It seems we are trying to run before we can walk.
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I agree with item 1. Without reforming the Tort and lawsuit systems in this country, health care reform is meaningless.
ReplyDeleteItem 2. I may be wrong but I believe that some Nurse-Practitioners are already allowed to operate independent businesses. The more common scenario, of course, is for a medical practice to have a number of nurse-practitioners available to see patients who are suffering from more common ailments (colds, the flu, or simple injuries).
Item 3. I think I need clarification on this one, but to force an increased number of students to attend medical school doesn't sound right to me. In the U.S., our current biggest problems are two-fold: 1) Public schools do not prepare kids for the kind of curriculum that medical students will experience, which means a high drop-out rate of American students and 2) The cost of a medical education coupled with the cost of malpractice insurance to protect your practice are strong inducements for promising and bright students to seek other vocations.
Item 4) You mean co-ops? On this one issue, I agree with President Obama. The insurance companies already have a lot of control over what procedures a doctor can perform that that the insurance company will pay for. But in many cases, this is because medical procedures are expensive for a whole host of reasons, such as the cost of research and development and the cost of the FDA approval process.
We need health care reform. Medicare/Medicaid are going broke and Insurance companies have too much control over the doctor/patient relationship. But I also agree that we something this complex can't be achieved in a single year. I'm prepared to let Congress haggle it out for years if necessary to get it right.