Gearing up a fight for Health Care Reform

Obama today delivered a speech to AMA (American Medical Association) on Health Care Reform. Over the last few months, the large interest groups are intensifying their opposition to HC Reform, centered around the public health insurance plan proposed by Obama. They resort to the old tactics of misleading advertisement. They tried to label the public health plan as government controlled HC. But what is the alternative that they propose? Just give individuals subsidies to purchase private health insurance. Is that reform? No they just want status quo.

But the country cannot afford not to have a true reform. The current system is broken. Maintaining status quo is NOT an option. Private insurance plans have failed to deliver any menaingful reform, or produce better patient outcomes. In fact, under the current system, patients get more treatments without having better clinical outcomes. US spends as much as three times per person on healthcare than other developed nations, yet delivering below-average clinical outcomes.

We have to change the system. Private insurance plans have failed. So there have to be something alternative. A public plan can help guide a better medical payment system that aligns physician and hospital reimbrusement with patient outcome, the so called pay-for-performance concept.

Without a public plan, health care reform is DEAD. Status quo wins, and the nation is going to the road of bankruptcy. Under the current system, Medicare Part A program alone has an obligation with net present value exceeding 100 trillion dollars! The system is completely broken. It must be fixed!

The fiscal problem is NOT the 1.75 trillion dollar budget deficit projected for 2009. The fiscal problem is how can we sustain the current spending trajectory of healthcare expense, not only for Medicare, but the nation as a whole.