Health Care in Politics - Bigger Government or Free Market?
Add comment February 4th, 2008
Brian J. Knabe, MD
With the state of the economy and world affairs, health care issues are not at the top of the agenda in the current political debate. But the next President and Congress may very well make some changes that could affect the landscape of medicine. President Bush brought up several of these issues in his final State of the Union address. As pointed out in the following link, he devoted only 159 words out of a total of 5,757 in his speech to health care.
http://blogs.wsj.com/health/2008/01/29/state-of-the-union-unpacking-bushs-health-talk/
He made the most of those words, and brought up a number of important subjects.
To build a future of quality health care, we must trust patients and doctors to make medical decisions and empower them with better information and better options. We share a common goal: making health care more affordable and accessible for all Americans. The best way to achieve that goal is by expanding consumer choice, not government control. So I have proposed ending the bias in the tax code against those who do not get their health insurance through their employer.
In the Democratic response, Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius pointed out Bush’s refusal to expand the State Children’s Health Insurance Program: We know that caring for our children, so they have a healthy and better start in life, is what grownups do. Governors in both parties, and a large majority of the Congress are ready, right now, to provide health care to 10 million American children, as a first step in overhauling our health care system. The differing viewpoints on this subject come down to the classic argument of bigger vs. smaller government, socializing the system vs. a market-based solution. Despite his recent propensity to spend, Bush comes down on the side of a free market approach in this case. While it is easy to pull at heart strings when it comes to providing health care for our children, it is important to look at what is actually being provided. The current Medicaid system is already overburdened, under-funded, and months behind on payments to hospitals and doctors. (see “Deadbeat State Hurts Hospitals, Agencies” at http://www.rrstar.com/news/columnists/x1059367743) Those who have tried to find a doctor accepting new Medicaid patients have probably been frustrated by the experience. Many physicians – primary care and specialists alike – accept very few if any new patients with government-funded insurance. People unaffected by this Medicaid issue may unfortunately find similar problems as they transition to Medicare.
Medicare - that is a whole new subject. See future blogs.
