In the last week, the ongoing Senate debate on the current health care bill took a disappointing and possibly pointless turn. The public option was negotiated away by Senate Democrats in hopes of passing the health care bill in another in a long line of compromises, none of which have appeared to be enough to the job of overhauling the nation’s ailing health care system.
Single payer health care was thrown off the table at the start, leaving the door open for a public option. From there the public option was watered with the option of “opting-out” for states that didn’t want to take part. Then it became a system where states that did want to participate would opt-in. And then of course came the version of the public option that included the “trigger” which would allow it only to come into play under certain conditions.
But now Senate Democrats have agreed to do away with the public option all together in return for drastic changes in Medicare and opening up what is know as the Federal Employee Health System, which covers eight million Americans (including many members of Congress) already. The minimum age for Medicare would be lowered from 65 to 55. What would remain the same is the process of phasing in the new system slowly, eventually requiring that all Americans have health insurance or face tax penalties, except under case of extreme financial hardship. Insurance companies would also be prohibited from denying coverage or cutting people off form coverage.
The new compromise would leave over 24 million Americans without health insurance, which is not much different than the situation America is already in. The idea of creating competition for private insurance companies is also gone with these new compromises, eliminating the possibility of any real change in premiums.
Federal employees who are already under the Federal Employee Health System are facing a 15 percent increase in costs next year, but how those kinds of increases are a change from the current standards is a question that has yet to be answered. Additionally, the cost of buying in to Medicare for people under 65 would cost $600 a month, which is hardly competitive for what an individual would be paying for private insurance.
While alarming, many of these compromises may turn out to be mute anyway. Sunday morning Senator Joe Lieberman, the ongoing thorn in the Democrats' side, said that he would not be voting for any bill that included a Medicare buy-in or a public option. Also spreading through the newswires are questions regarding the feelings of the more liberal Democrat Senators who have threatened to vote against any health care bill that doesn’t include the public option. How firmly they intend to follow through on those threats remains to be seen.
President Obama will be the eighth president to attempt a complete overhaul of America’s health care system. The previous seven have all failed. America pays more for health care than any other country in the world with 16 percent of the U.S. economy being eaten up by the cots of health care. Reform is needed now, more than ever.
