Healthcare Reform

What you need to know about Health Care Reform

The debate about Health Care has been raging in America, and in the halls of Congress, for decades. Democratic presidents, dating back to Harry Truman, have tried unsuccessfully, to “change the playing field” by re-doing and reforming health care.

Interestingly, both sides agree that health care reform is necessary. The problem is now, and has always been, finding the best way to do it. There are many flaws in the current American Health Care system. To begin, it is much too expensive. The twin entitlements of Medicare and Medicaid, created during the Lyndon Johnson presidency way back in the 1960s has, over time, become prohibitively expensive. But, there is no way any politician can end either program.

Each of these programs has become an “entitlement.” People who enjoy their benefits would not willingly give them up. And yet, the costs for these programs have far outgrown the original estimates, causing taxes to increase in many other areas as a way to keep both Medicare and Medicaid viable.

Reform is needed in other ways, too. There is massive fraud that takes place daily in every corner of the country. Unethical and crooked physicians (there are some) double bill, even triple bill for services given only once, often to elderly patients who are unaware of the scam taking place. Obviously, when multiplied by hundreds, or even thousands, of physicians, this bogus expense adds billions of dollars to the annual health care bill.

Looking for another problem? You don’t have to look too far to find a very serious problem. Juries regularly award individuals (former patients) millions and millions of dollars in medical malpractice litigations. The awards are often ridiculously excessive and result in devastating financial losses for the physicians who lose these cases.

Of course, even before they suffer courtroom losses, physicians find that they have to protect themselves with egregiously expensive malpractice insurance. These plans can cost the average physician in excess of $100,000 yearly. Reform is absolutely necessary in this area. And that reform should come in the form of a “cap,” a dollar limit to the amount a jury can award an aggrieved party.

Of course, attorneys who earn millions of dollars representing patients who sue their physicians vehemently oppose any change to the existing law. But, most fair-minded people agree, change is necessary.

The cost of health insurance is excessively high, too. That’s because competition has been stifled by interstate commerce laws. A practical reform would be one that enables insurance companies, regardless of physical location, to sell health insurance in all fifty states. The obvious result of this reform would be dramatically increased competition … and, of course, much lower premiums.

There are other reforms that can, and should, be made to improve health care in America. The ones mentioned here are among the most important. The problem is, however, that, as is true with every other debate in America, there is fierce opposition to change … any change.

Reform is necessary. It just may be some time before it takes place.