There’s something in the air about health care and health insurance reform these days. From an optimists’ standpoint, even the poor economy and rising uninsured rates are a good sign that real reform is inspired and is coming.
It looks more and more like everything is falling into place politically, as well.
A New York Times article recently reported that lawmakers, health care experts, business organizations, and health insurance companies are in “secret ” negotiations right now in Washington D.C. hashing out details of reform.
It doesn’t hurt either that the Democrats hold control of both Houses of Congress and the White House.
From the overall tone of the Times’ report, it’s the closest this country has ever been to sweeping health reform in modern history.
Former President Bill Clinton’s efforts to overhaul the system failed because the negotiations were closed-door, and didn’t include opinions from all sides.
As the Times put it, the Clinton Administration accused health insurance companies of “price gouging and profiteering. ”
Things have changed this time around, with U.S. Senator Edward Kennedy leading the way.
Senator Kennedy is working hard to include all affected parties in this debate, and negotiations are making serious progress.
The three biggest, and most general, elements of reform being discussed are high costs of health care, high costs of health insurance, and a nationwide health insurance mandate.
As for the first two, there’s no doubt all parties agrees every American needs to have affordable health insurance, and the health care industry needs to reign in its costs. But for the third, there’s far less agreement on whether a mandate should be implemented in the near future or not.
“Forcing individuals to purchase insurance in the current market would be a disaster. Before we even have that discussion, we need to make health care more affordable and improve its quality, ” said James P. Gelfand, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s senior manager of health policy.
So where are we in the debate? Looks like something’s going to give. How soon? Well, that’s a whole different question.