‘Top Line’: House Dems Insist on Public Option
EmailABC News’ Rick Klein reports: As the Senate Finance Committee works on a version of health care reform that doesn’t include a “public option,” House Democrats today unveiled their own plan — with a public option as one of the centerpieces. Rep. Rush Holt, D-N.J., said on ABCNews.com’s “Top Line” today that there should “absolutely” be a public option built into any reform plans — to ensure better service from private insurers, and to provide an insurer of last resort. “Should there be a public option? I think absolutely there should be,” Holt told us. “One is to provide really honest competition. To have a way of injecting best practice into the medical profession. Because, you know, a lot of people out there are not really concerned about who pays for it and how. They want to know that their mother, or their daughter, or their son gets good care.” “The public option is a way of injecting good quality care, patient-oriented care, into the process,” he added. “It also provides a safety valve and a backstop in a sense that it will be a place where people can take refuge if their employer doesn’t provide healthcare. This will be an affordable, we expect, alternative.” Asked whether he’d sacrifice bipartisanship in the interest of getting a public plan in the bill — since leading Republicans have said they consider such a move a deal-breaker — Holt said he’s not giving up hope. “I’m not sure if either bipartisanship or a public option,” he said. “I think what we need to do is focus on the patient. And if we focus on the patient, everyone can agree that what we’re trying to do here is put an emphasis on primary care, on training nurse practitioners, on getting the health records in a way that benefit the patient more than the insurance company. If we keep that focus, I think people of all parties — or no parties — will come together.” We also talked with Holt about a bill he’s sponsoring, the Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act, that would create a national standard for voting that requires paper ballots to be used. In 20 states, Holt said, “the results of the election, of any election, of any federal election, cannot be audited. If there is a problem, chances are no one will know. And if a problem is identified there will be no way of resolving it. That’s because unverifiable electronic voting systems are totally unverifiable and therefore recounts are meaningless.” Watch the full interview with Rep. Rush Holt HERE. Also today, we sat down with The New York Times’ Jeff Zeleny about the health care push, the latest polls, and — in Zeleny’s analogy — the president’s move to Broadway from community theater. (Zeleny, who covered Obama as a senator for the Chicago Tribune, says he seems like the same guy — mostly.) Watch the interview with Jeff Zeleny HERE.
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Someone should tell the Democrats in the U.S. Senate that the American people also clearly want the public option being a part of any health care reform plans, as shown in this very recent national opinion poll….
June, 2009 NBC/Wall Street Journal Survey
“In any health care proposal, how important do you feel it is to give people a choice of both a public plan administered by the federal government and a private plan for their health insurance––extremely important, quite important, not that important, or not at all important?”
Extremely important – 41%
Quite important – 35%
Not that important – 12%
Not at all important – 8%
Not sure – 4%
Posted by: Glenn | June 19, 2009, 3:03 pm 3:03 pm
The Dems public option means that there will be NO option in health care. We are turning into the EU. If you want their form of health care MOVE there. Can you spell RATIONING??? Do not take the best health care in the world and turn it into NO CHOICE, NO OPTION…NO COUNTRY.
Posted by: Tony Stelly | June 19, 2009, 3:35 pm 3:35 pm
I’m an American that lives in Canada and everyone has health care here plus insurance from our employers we don’t ration our healthcare I love my country and am still an American but do to the healthcare in my country I could not afford to move back. My husband has rhematoid arthritis the drugs alone would kill you financially but not in Canada my drug bill for him including high blood pressure medication and high cholestrol medication comes to 80 some dollars for 3 months supply how much do you think that would cost in the US. It is a shame that my country does not have a decent healthcare unfortunately the insurance companies and drug companies are in cahoots with each other. Let OBAMA implement a healthcare system and iron out the details later. RJ
Posted by: RJ | June 19, 2009, 4:05 pm 4:05 pm
NO WATERED DOWN HEALTHCARE… BUSH TOLD THE AMERICAN PEOPLE TO GO TO COMMUNITY PUBLIC HEALTH CLINICS……..HAHA.
NO OTHER WAY…. PUBLIC OPTION NOW.
Posted by: tychisum | June 19, 2009, 5:46 pm 5:46 pm
A public option with private policies operating alongside is brilliant. A public option gives everyone a basic level of care without worry that seeing a doctor equals bankruptcy. Just think, instead of waiting to check on the lump in their armpit and find the cancer after it’s too late or at least much more expensive to treat, people will actually see a doctor when they should which saves everyone money if they’re in the long run. And if a person so chooses, an additional private policy could eliminate almost any out of pocket expenses for the consumer. In truth, even single payer operates alongside a private insurance industry so the republican arguments that either will break the private sector are nothing but red-herrings. We want a public option now, bi-partisan ship be d..ned.
Posted by: PUBLIC OPTION | June 19, 2009, 7:28 pm 7:28 pm
We have roughly 300 million Americans. The claim is that there are 45 million — 15% — with no health insurance. This leaves approximately 255 million Americans, or 85%, with health insurance.
According to a 2006 ABC News-Kaiser Family Foundation-USA Today survey. It was found that 89% of Americans were satisfied with the quality of their own health care.
Don’t need a public option, the federal government needs to demonstrate to the public that they can sucessfully operate Medicare which they never have in all of the years they have been funding it. Once this is shown and we can get an idea of the true cost (I don’t believe it is anywhere near what the folks in Congress are telling us, way higher) then a informed decision can be made.
Posted by: Sandcrab1612 | June 19, 2009, 10:08 pm 10:08 pm
Well the fact is that if you look, acually do the research you will find that every member of congress that is against the public health care option has large amounts of money comming in from the health care industry. Can anyone say conflict of interests. Almost all of these are republicans by the way. They are trying to fear the public into beliving that public heath care will give everyone no option to choose. Thats a load of bull people will still be able to pay the bloated heath care costs of regular insurence if they want what exacally is stoping them? Fact is the public option will make the heath care CEOs lose money and since republicans are in there pockets they will fight against it thats only normal. If your company was about to lose money and you were going to lose money because of it you would fight it too. These republicans are fighting for the insurence companies and not for the american people. In america the people elect there congressmen but the intrest groups pay them. So since we dont serve there bank accounts they dont care about whats good for us. I dont understand why the rest of the country doesnt realize this. They will tell you no no its not that simple. Fact is it is that simple they just try to complicate it so you dont see the truth.
Posted by: mike | June 20, 2009, 8:20 am 8:20 am
The “public” option now in medicare is only reimbursing doctors and hospitals at 80% of their COST! Our local hospital is laying off nurses and health care workers because of these government policies. It raises all the costs to the rest of us, because this money has to made up somewhere. NOTHING IS FREE! If we offer a public (government) option, doctors and hospitals and drug companies will not be reimubursed properly but forced to cut care, cut workers and reduce excellence. This will raise the costs to the rest of us to where our 1300 current insurance companies cannot compete with government and they will quit, forcing us all onto an inferior government run program.
Posted by: Gary | June 21, 2009, 1:12 am 1:12 am
My new insurance bill arrived and it is up 30% again. I run a small business and I pay double my counterparts in large corporations. Over the past 15 years the costs keep going up and up and there is no apparent reason. I wait longer in medical offices for visits and tests and I have good insurance. It stinks! I have come from a public system (Australia & UK) and what we have here is NO better.
This is a free market economy – then let the govt be free to set up a system too, if it does not work it will be apparent and it will be disbanded, if it does work, then the private sector will have to change its game plan…abount time.
Posted by: Martin | June 21, 2009, 9:20 am 9:20 am