Health Reform NOW!

With so many major issues facing our new President, and his adminstration's efforts to tackle multiple problems at once, I would posit that the exhorbitant and spiraling costs of health insurance, along with lack of access to affordable health care, is at the root of our current depression and is the most urgent domestic matter on the table.

As one of 17 million self-employed persons in the United States, who must buy individual health insurance in the open market, this cost, or rather, burden, is crippling entrepreneurs at a rapidly accelerating pace. From 2001 to 2008, monthly premiums have more than doubled, and now exceed the average monthly mortgage payment. Personally, it's the largest bill I pay each month. Even better, this is for HMO coverage in Florida, which is useless anywhere else in the country barring emergency. Better still, if I develop a condition or disease, I won't ever be able to switch to another carrier, or lower the premium, as coverage for pre-existing conditions will be denied.

I've often wondered what the 170 million people in this country, with health care provided by their employers, would do if they woke up tomorrow morning in my shoes. Or the 75 million Seniors, Disabled and poverty stricken, who are covered under either Medicare or Medicaid. It should infuriate you that the self-employed, who work and play by the same rules as everyone else, pay 10, 20 and 30 times what you pay for generally inferior coverage.

Until our current economic collapse, the only people who had a real understanding of the plight of the insured, self-employed were the 46 million citizens in this country who are completely uninsured, and another 25 million who are grossly underinsured, and will incur financial ruin if any non-routine health issue arises.

It would seem that with so many millions of people lacking insurance, not having enough or being gouged to death, someone would have declared a crisis a long time ago. In fairness, many politicians have been trying for years to overhaul the mess but they've been beaten back repeatedly by insurers, unions, doctors, pharmaceuticals, chambers of commerce throughout the country and much of the GOP.

Now that our economy is losing more than 1/2 million jobs a month for the past 5 months, the matter of health care coverage/insurance affordability has sprung to the forefront. Whether we're talking about the astronomical job losses in manufacturing and, particularly, the automotive industry, coupled with as many or more job losses across the financial sector, the people being laid off now, by and large, had gold-plated, "cadillac" health insurance coverage and paid virtually nothing for it. They are now facing my grim reality of either paying out $1000 or more a month for substandard, limited choice, or going without.

The Economic Stimulus Plan which was just signed by President Obama will allow laid off workers to buy into COBRA (available to the unemployed who previously had group coverage), with the government picking up 65% of the cost for 9 of the 18 months for which Cobra applies. This is an improvement but hardly a solution. Even if you're drawing the maximum unemployment check, $300/month for family coverage is unaffordable if one doesn't have substantial savings. And there is a caveat which applies. If you've lost your job because your employer went bankrupt, no longer exists, or dropped their group coverage, you are not eligible for COBRA. The list of companies big and small which have declared bankruptcy, closed or dropped coverage in the last year is so long, I won't run the list but, suffice it to say, their former employees are not eligible for COBRA.

The lack of access and affordability to basic health care in this country is a pox and national disgrace. It's crippling individuals, families and businesses and doing nothing can no longer be tolerated. Every player in this debacle should be shackled to a table and chair and instructed that they are not leaving until a solution is had. Anyone, government official or otherwise, who refuses to join in the solution should immediately lose goverment or company provided coverage. That ought to guarantee no bailouts.

Everyone in the process, as well as all of us, will have to give something. A short list includes expanding Community Health Centers around the country and allowing physician assitants and nurse practioners to provide routine care. Administrative costs must be reigned in. Doctors must move to electronic records. Hospitals must get their costs under control. Waste and abuse must be iradicated. Medical suppliers must be regulated and monitored. Drug re-importation must be permitted. Gold plated and fee for service plans must be taxed as income. Obese individuals must pay more as, outside of the elderly, they are the largest consumers of healthcare. Childhood immunizations must be free. Above all else, those with pre-existing conditions must be able to obtain coverage with no riders.

To anyone who says we cannot afford to fix the system and provide coverage for all, I say the United States of America cannot afford to say no, and will become a third world nation, if we continue on this ruinous path.