Edwards pushing universal health care

[ckramer]

Democratic presidential contender John Edwards says it is more important to invest in universal health care and lifting people out of poverty than to reduce the budget deficit.

"If I were choosing now between which is more important, I think the investments are more important," he said on ABC's "This Week."

Edwards' proposal, which includes tax cuts and a million housing vouchers for the poor, may place him at odds with Democrats in charge of the congressional spending committees.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070102/ap_on_el_pr/white_house2008

He's going into a right direction.

[derby378]

1. I wish I could agree, but...

We are staring at a record $8 trillion (and climbing) in national debt. A full-fledged single-payer universal health care system will have to be phased in gradually.

[Mass]

3. You are assuming this is what Edwards proposes. However, he has not

given any details. Who knows what he is actually proposing?

[derby378]

4. Let's just say I'm forcing the issue

Besides, it takes major medical decisions out of the hands of insurance bean-counters with dubious MBAs...

[MannyGoldstein]

5. Universal Healthcare Actually Costs Less

In every single instance where it's been tried, single-payer universal health care (e.g., Medicare expanded to everyone) results in MUCH lower costs and better medical outcomes.

The US spends more per capita on health care than any other country, by far - twice as much as the average first-world country. Our medical outcomes are among the worst in the first world - we roughly equal Cuba in this regard.

[goddess40]

16. You're right, single payer will save us money

and everyone will get coverage - it's a win - win for everyone but the greedy, ethically bankrupt insurance,hospital and drug companies. Making huge profits off of the sick and dieing is just wrong.

[Red1]

6. We

could start paying for it by eliminating the one trillion dollar subsidy this administration gave to the nazi pharmaceutical industry.

[derby378]

8. Good point, but since the money has already been spent...

We could also insist that any pharmaceutical firm that wishes to sell its medicines in America cannot use impoverished Africans as guinea pigs who can be tossed aside at will.

[kath]

19. Jeebus. One TRILLION?!

what sort of subsidies does Bushco give Big Pharma?

[Hieronymus]

17. No way should Universal healthcare be phased in ..

we need it now.

[GreenTea]

25. It must be done now.

[clixtox]

18. Tax The Rich And Super Rich, Pretty Radical...

True Universal Health Care and the national debt retirement can both be paid for quite easily and quickly by taxing those who benefit the most from our economic and social system.

As long as elected politicians have to rely on raising money to get re-elected nothing is going to change much, if at all. Most of the folks we elect seem to be quickly seduced or corrupted if they weren't before. Keeping the elected office, or getting a more powerful position, becomes, by far, the main objective. Any benefit for those they supposedly represent has to be agreeable to their corporate, and rich individual, sponsors and/or underwriters.

No one is going to give more than half a hoot about working folks or the poor and hidden poor with the way everything is "arranged" now. "Liberal" solutions will never succeed, fundamental changes are required.

[Mass]

2. Every 08 primary candidate will use the term "Universal healthcare".

Just like "global warming" and "fairness to the middle class", these are words that are necessary to have a chance to be elected.

However, the devil is in the details and Edwards has not yet given any details on what he calls "universal healthcare". Remember Romney is touting his "Universal Healthcare" in MA, even if it is more a mandatory insurance than a right to healthcare. So, please, could we have details and not just a few keywords.

Here is a good example of how "Universal healthcare" can be used to promote something that is NOT single-payer insurance. It is still better than what exists and answers to some real problems, but it shows that people put different meaning under the same words (and, as far as I know, Wyden is not running for 08).
http://wyden.senate.gov/media/2006/12132006_Healthy_Americans_Act.htm

[benny05]

9. JRE working on UHC Plan

He said in Iowa that he and his team are working on a plan at the moment. And he wasn't for "improved access" etc. UHC is a must.

[Mass]

10. What does that mean? For different people, it means different things.

Do you have details? If not, I will wait for them before deciding if this is really UHC.

If not, it is just a word. Romney calls his plan universal healthcare, so does Wyden. Kerry has used the term too,... To my knowledge, only Kucinich has a real UHC to this day.

[benny05]

12. If I had details, I'd post them

My take is that UHC means more than just "affordable" or "improved access"; he wants UHC for all, not just insurance, which is what Romney did. But until I see details, which I haven't, I don't have any at the moment. sorry..

There's something peculiar about what happened in Massachusetts with that legislation. I'll try to find out and get back here soon. Stay tuned.

[enough already]

27. It needs to mean "FREE"

Everything else is just spin and window dressing. Let's see who has the real balls to propose it.

[karynnj]

15. Here's Kerry's plan from a July 31, 2006 Faneuil Hall Speech

http://www.johnkerry.com/news/speeches/speech.html?id=1

I will be interested to see what Edwards ends up actually proposing.

[kath]

20. Kerry's plan is NOT what we need, and I suspect that Edwards' plan

is just as weaselly.
Kerry talks about "keeping costs down", "reinsurance", "affordable coverage", bla, bla. Note that INSURANCE COMPANIES are still involved in the whole mess.

We need what EVERY other first-world nation has had for decades --SINGLE PAYER health care, free for everyone. ELIMINATE the bloodsucking, parasitic insurance companies' role, and rein in Big Pharma, big time.

[karynnj]

21. Kerry's plan would be a major improvement over what we have

and the concensus of experts in 2004 was that it was doable.

Be careful of throwing out something good because it is not perfect. I think it unlikely that the US would eliminate the insurance companies completely.

[kath]

22. EVERY single other developed nation has done so. Why not us?

Our measures of health, such as infant mortality, are right down there with third world countries. This is absolutely appalling, immoral, unChristian, whatever you want to call it.

The insurance companies suck VAST amounts of money out of the system and provide nothing of value in return. Big Pharma are a bunch of bloodsuckers as well.

[karynnj]

29. The fact that we started on a different path makes it harder

I understand that the sum of the money spent on insuring people is more than it would take to insure everyone - the problem is how would you aggregate all of it and refocus it? Especially knowing that people with insurance would be concerned that the new system gave them as much as what they currently have. Also, people paying for their own insurance shouldn't be penalized as they opted to pay.

If a government paid single payer system was set up, there seems no way that the government could require companies and individuals to pay what they've paid in the past. How do you do it, when whether the companies who paid is a result of how progressive they were or their history? On the small business side, part of Kerry's plan was to havea tax credit to partly compensate a company for doing it. For companies, making it cheaper would allow more companies to afford it. (the benefit to the company is a healthier work and a competive advantage in hiring vs companies that don't have it.)

I don't know if it is intentional, but the government covering the catastopic claims is a way to get a foot in the door for universal coverage. Think of it as an insurance policy for all with a very high deductable. That back up policy allows both individuals and companies to get coverage at a lower rate as the biggest risk isn't there. By lowering the definition of "catastopic" over time, it could become a single payer system of insurance.

Recently, the big three automakers have backed this idea because they agree with what Kerry said in 2004 - that the current system puts them at a disadvantage with Canada and other countries. Having the industries that PAY for insurance and the consumers on the our side MIGHT be enough to defeat the insuarance lobby.

The point is Senator Kerry offered a plan that could take us from where we are to a place where everyone could have insurance. It starts with the situation as it is and offers a workable plan to get to where we need to be. It is a plan for NOW, not some future time when people with insurance will see that it is important that everyone have what they have.

[cdnwannabe]

7. Until this country has some sort of corporate charter....

so that corporations pay their fair share, it will be difficult to recover from this crushing debt, let alone fund necessary things like universal health care. Retrieving that trillion dollar give-away to pharma would be a tremendous help as well.

[jaybeat]

13. Actually, there's plenty of money in the system right now.

If you add up everything that private employers pay, everything paid by individuals (private premiums, co-pays, fees for uncovered services and Rx, Medicare tax, etc.), plus state, federal and local health care spending (general fund support for Medicare, Medicaid, clinics and services for uninsured, etc., etc.), there's *more* than enough to provide every citizen with *great* coverage, cradle to grave, without adding to the deficit or raising taxes. (Some costs, like health insurance premiums, might be redirected to the government from the rat-hole they go to now, but no net payment increase would be required.) Plus, if we let the purchasing power of a single-payer system do its thing on the pharmahypocritical industry, we'd save even more. Plus, Medicare is *much* more efficient than private insurance, and serving the uninsured becomes much less expensive if they're, well, insured, etc., etc. (I don't have a link but former Oregon governor and ER physician John Kitzhaber (D) has made this case very well.)

I think the deficit argument is ultimately a smoke-screen. UHC would *save* money.

[enough already]

28. Another source of funding is $ paid for benefits for retirees by corps, local and state governments

Redirect all that money to feds and move those retirees into a single payer system.

[dk2]

11. These are issue too long and ignored

I am thankful that John Edwards is including Mental health issues in his planning. I am looking forward to his finally Universal Health Care plan. There are many way to pay for the plan, just by getting lower Drug cost should help in the cost of it.

I am really, really glad that a candidate has put this on the front burner from the begining in his annoucement to run.

[nashville_brook]

14. welcome to dk2!

here's a link to something interesting about lowering drug costs:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=2671835&mesg_id=2671835


Two UK-based academics have devised a way to invent new medicines and get them to market at a fraction of the cost charged by big drug companies, enabling millions in poor countries to be cured of infectious diseases and potentially slashing the NHS drugs bill.

Sunil Shaunak, professor of infectious diseases at Imperial College, based at Hammersmith hospital, calls their revolutionary new model "ethical pharmaceuticals".

Improvements they devise to the molecular structure of an existing, expensive drug turn it technically into a new medicine which is no longer under a 20-year patent to a multinational drug company and can be made and sold cheaply.

The process has the potential to undermine the monopoly of the big drug companies and bring cheaper drugs not only to poor countries but back to the UK.

[Sirveri]

23. Just nationalize the insurance companies.

Everyone keeps their policies and insurance and we can phase in and destroy the insurance companies at will. Want to keep everyone happy and you can simply buy the insurance companies and then run them at cost.

[FrenchieCat]

24. Universal Health Care and Single Payer Health Care are not the same things......

So what is John Edwards proposing? Universal Health Care can be Multi Payer or Single Payer. So Which one is John Edwards advocating?

In 2004, Clark stance on the issue: "Supports universal health coverage"
Clark said he supports universal health coverage that includes preventive care.
http://www.ontheissues.org/2004/Wesley_Clark_Health_Care.htm

As of January 2006, Wes Clark has talked about phasing into Single-Payer Health Care system in this country cause that's where we need to end up. Can't get there in one fell swoop because of the logistical nightmare that would involve though.......

Wes Clark Endorses Transition to Single-Payer
by Scott Shields, Mon Jan 30, 2006 at 05:34:10 PM EST

Even using the phrase "single-payer system" is a somewhat gutsy move on his part. As President Bush is set to announce his 'less insurance, not more' plan for HSAs, Clark is boldly willing to move the other way, not just accept compromise. Of course, he's talking about an eventual transition, but at least he acknowledges that it is the ultimate goal. The proposals many Democrats have put forward in the past have been pretty sound (like Kerry's call for government-sponsored catastrophic reinsurance), but too many seem to shy away from explicitly endorsing the one system that makes the most sense. I'm glad to see Clark join the ranks of Democrats who aren't afraid of speaking up.
http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/1/30/17455/5250

[karynnj]

30. This sounds good - I hope that Clark

is working on how you accomplish the transition. When you think of the complex, convoluted mess that is our countries health insurance - it's tough to think about how you do transition to something that is more streamlined and saner.

Clark has the intellectual integrity to attack the problem from where we are. It is simply not likely that you can propose a plan thet is the currect mess on 12/31 and a simple single payer system on 1/1.

A mechanism like Kerry's catastopic insurance could be a means to transition. If you gradually lower the catastropic limit, it becomes the single payer system. Any remaining private insurance below it would then become more like prepaid health care rather than insurance against potential risks.

[eridani]

26. I used the Edwards contact form to ask about this last week

Namely, I asked him if he would support HR 676 or HR 1200. No answer yet. Any plan which allows insurance companies to keep on stealing 30% of our health care dollars is NOT going to be really universal.