Monday, February 22, 2010

Current President's Health Care Proposal

The Current President has released the Health Care Proposal. We will provide an analysis shortly but it is more of what has been seen in the past year.

The first section states:

The President’s Proposal puts American families and small business owners in control of their own health care.

• It makes insurance more affordable by providing the largest middle class tax cut for health care in history, reducing premium costs for tens of millions of families and small business owners who are priced out of coverage today. This helps over 31 million Americans afford health care who do not get it today – and makes coverage more affordable for many more.

• It sets up a new competitive health insurance market giving tens of millions of Americans the exact same insurance choices that members of Congress will have.

• It brings greater accountability to health care by laying out commonsense rules of the road to keep premiums down and prevent insurance industry abuses and denial of care.

• It will end discrimination against Americans with pre-existing conditions.

• It puts our budget and economy on a more stable path by reducing the deficit by $100 billion over the next ten years – and about $1 trillion over the second decade – by cutting government overspending and reining in waste, fraud and abuse.

The second point above is the revival of the Public Option. I guess the wooden stake did not work.

The Health Care Centers, revival of Public Health Systems, is given some prominence as follows:

Invest in Community Health Centers. Community health centers play a critical role in providing quality care in underserved areas. About 1,250 centers provide care to 20 million people, with an emphasis on preventive and primary care. The Senate bill increases funding to these centers for services by $7 billion and for construction by $1.5 billion over 5 years. The House bill provides $12 billion over the same 5 years. Bridging the difference, the President’s Proposal invests $11 billion in these centers.

There is a push for technology as well:

Use of Technology for Real-Time Data Review. The President’s Proposal speeds access to claims data to identify potentially fraudulent payments more quickly. It establishes a system for using technology to provide real-time data analysis of claim and payments under public programs to identify and stop waste, fraud and abuse. (Source: Roskam Amendment offered in House Ways & Means Committee markup)

He seems to have sidestepped the abortion and CER issues. Also there is a wholesale overhaul of Medicare which should be mandated. More later.