Republicans Have Own Health Care Plan

Say Democrats' Reform Plan Costs Too Much, Punishes Seniors

Nov 2, 2009

Republicans say the health care reform bill passed by House Democrats is too expensive, too bureaucratic, too tough on seniors, and, at 1,990 pages, just too much.

House Republican leader, John Boehner of Ohio, said in a radio interview on Fox News, Congress should “pass about eight or nine separate small bills that say let's get rid of junk lawsuits, let’s allow Americans to buy insurance across state lines, let’s let individuals and small employers group together so they can buy health insurance at the same kind of prices that big companies and unions do today. These are common sense things that will bring down the cost of health insurance to make it more affordable for more Americans.”

Republican Health Care Proposals

Those are three of the four “common sense reforms” outlined on the Republican web site that addresses health care issues. The fourth would allow states to create additional reforms to lower health costs.

The Democrats’ bill would eventually allow Americans to buy health insurance across state lines at, the party hopes, prices that are competitive with the volume discounts offered to big companies and unions. But the bill does not address tort reform, which Republicans have been seeking for years, or additional action by the states.

The bill’s public option, Boehner said, “will drive all the private health-care companies out of business… I think this is leading us toward a single payer national health care system and it will bankrupt our kids and grandchildren.”

The GOP web site says that during further debate on health care, the party will introduce a plan based on eight bills, all introduced since May. Boehner told the Washington Post that the Republican bill would not forbid insurance companies from denying coverage of preexisting conditions, as the Democrats’ bill does. Other Republican leaders said their bill would not contain a key element of the Democrats’ bill: subsidies to help lower-income people afford insurance.

Medicare Cuts Attacked

Republicans object to the Democrats’ plan to fund the health care reforms partly through cuts in Medicaid. Many of the cuts would be taken from Medicare Advantage programs. Medicare Advantage, passed under President George W. Bush, allows Medicare recipients to leave the traditional fee-for-service plan and enroll in HMOs that offer varying services. Some of those HMOs wound up costing more than the fee-for-service plan.

Boehner told Fox, “I’ve got 27,000 Medicare Advantage enrollees in my district, and according to the Congressional Budget Office, the cuts to Medicare Advantage will result in 80 percent of them loosing the coverage they have and forcing them into traditional Medicare.”

Republicans also object to the cost of the bill, which various experts put as high as $1.2 trillion over 10 years, although Democrats say it will be funded by the Medicare cuts, premiums paid by people enrolled in the public option, taxes on businesses that don’t offer health insurance and individuals who don’t enroll in a plan, and an additional tax on individuals earning more than $500,000 a year and couples earning more than $1 million.

The Democratic bill “will raise the cost of Americans' health insurance premiums; it will kill jobs with tax hikes and new mandates; and it will cut seniors' Medicare benefits,” Boehner said in a speech Oct. 31.

SOURCES: Rep. John Boehner’s web site, healthcare.gop.gov, Washington Post, Associated Press

The copyright of the article Republicans Have Own Health Care Plan in US State Policy is owned by Mark Toor. Permission to republish Republicans Have Own Health Care Plan in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.