Last week, Congressman Pete Stark (R-CA), Chairman of the House Ways and Means Health Subcommittee, held a hearing on 2lst century healthcare reform. In his remarks Congressman Stark said, “Comprehensive health reform is needed to ensure affordable health coverage for the 46 million uninsured. Today’s experts made clear that the option of a public health insurance plan is the key to slowing the health spending trend and improving quality.”
Representative Pete Stark’s view of the public plan stands in stark contrast to Representative Louie Gohmert’s view.
CMPI recently interviewed Congressman Gohmert (R-TX) and he was pointed in his belief that a public health plan is merely an effort to nationalize the healthcare system.
In our interview with Congressman Gohmert he said of a public health plan, “This is a straw dog you build up and say, oh no, we’ll allow private insurance companies to compete knowing the government will be able to put them out of business even if it runs at a massive deficit.”
We have already had a hint of this scheme with the comparative effectiveness research contained in the Stimulus bill.
Congressman Stark recently expressed his support for this research: “The new research will eventually save money and lives, although it may very well shorten the lifespan of some senior citizens who would not be allowed to receive some treatments even if they volunteer to pay for them themselves.”
According to the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, the February 15, 2009 New York Times article did not include this entire quote from Stark AAPS states “this version was taken down, and the quotation was truncated after ‘money and lives.’”
Asked in December of last year about any concerns he had in bringing private insurers to the table for an agreement on health reform, Stark said of insurance companies: “They’re the easiest to roll because no one likes insurance companies. I guess someone has to be the bad guys.”
If the goal is to reduce premiums, why not support an end to community rating, guaranteed issue, insurance mandates, etc., which all works to drive up insurance premiums and make plans less responsive to the individual medical needs of patients?
