Howard Dean Attempts to Spread Truth About Health Care Reform
Here are some highlights from the Esquire interview of Howard Dean. BFIA would like to recommend taking the time to check out the entire interview at Esquire. Dean, apparently not knowing the secret handshake, tells it exactly how it is.
by John H. Richardson
~ As a doctor married to a doctor, Howard Dean made health care a priority of his administration, putting strict regulations on health insurance profiteering and figuring out a way to extend insurance to every child in the state. In a new book called Howard Dean's Prescription for Real Health Care Reform, he makes a persuasive case for reform.
ESQUIRE: Your book really lays everything out in a very simple, clear way. It's obvious this is something you've been thinking about for a long time.
HOWARD DEAN: It was one of the reasons I ran for president.
ESQ: One thing I've never seen before is when you say, “Much is made of the 47 million without insurance, but nothing of the 25 million who have insurance but don't go and see the doctor.” I've got one of those high-deductible catastrophic plans myself, so I don't go to the doctor unless I'm bleeding. Why have I never seen this argument before?
HD: Because 99 percent of the discussions among reporters, policy wonks, and politicians focus on the uninsured — which is, frankly, why nothing is passed. They don't focus on the majority of Americans who have health insurance that doesn't work.
ESQ: Boil it down, if you would. Why isn't it working even if you do have insurance?
HD: Because it's too expensive. The private sector can't manage costs. Health care is one of the few places — defense is another — that the government works more efficiently and more effectively than the private sector. That's just a fact.
ESQ: Why is that?
HD: Because there is no feedback in the private health-care system. When I was practicing medicine, nobody with substernal chest pain ever got off my examining table and said, “The guy down the street does it for $2,000 cheaper, I'll see you later.” That's why we've had 40 years of costs that increase between two and three times the rate of inflation every single year. It's breaking our economic system. People are yelling and screaming about jobs going to China, but they're not yelling and screaming about jobs going to Canada. But they are. Because the right-wingers can scream and yell about rationing if they want, but economically their system works much better than ours does.
ESQ: I've seen nothing about that during this debate. But in the book you talk about GM and — or was it Toyota? — moving their new factories just across the bridge to Ontario to take advantage of the Canadian health-care system.
HD: Toyota did also, but GM and Ford were the big ones.
ESQ: It seems pretty obvious. They save money. So why are businesses so completely resistant to this?
HD: They're not. Some businesses — and the Chamber of Commerce — are resistant because they're ideological. They are part of the right wing. Then there are lots of businesses that aren't particularly ideological but genuinely believe that if they keep doing the same thing, they'll somehow get a different outcome. That's human nature. They think they can manage health-care costs even though it's been 40 years since any of them ever have. That's why I think Obama's plan is so great: If you like what you have, you can keep it.
ESQ: Speaking of the Obama plan, you're even stronger than he has been lately in support of the public plan. You say that without it, it's not reform.
HD: It's not. It's a waste of time. Don't pretend you're going to do health-insurance reform unless you're really going to change the system. The discussions in the Senate have not been about changing the system.
ESQ: They seem to be worried about preserving the status quo.
HD: Washington is the most conservative town in America. Its culture is the most resistant to change except a few religious cults.
ESQ: [Laughter]
HD: It's true! It's absolutely true.
ESQ: You say that the public plan shouldn't be able to dip into general government reserves to subsidize its operations. But the Republicans say it will.
HD: The Republicans just make things up out of whole cloth. Nothing they say about health care is true. It's all just nonsense and fears and what-ifs. It doesn't happen. First of all, Medicare doesn't dip into government reserves. It has never happened. It might happen in 10 years if they don't cut benefits or raise taxes, but so far, never in the history of America has a program like Medicare used public reserves. The Republican tactic is to raise objections because they never have anything positive to say themselves.
ESQ: In the book you ask, “Is health insurance really health insurance or an extension of the things that have been happening on Wall Street?”
HD: Think about it. What the big insurance companies have done is deny claims just so they can improve their bottom line. That's just extraordinary.
ESQ: And what about the public plan?
HD: I think that the Senate needs to understand that the American people want a public plan. That's not an advocate talking. That's the facts of the polls. People want the choice. And why shouldn't the American people get to choose instead of the big Washington government making the choice for them? So I think the Senate will come to understand that their first job is to serve the American people and not the health-insurance industry.
(click here to read the entire article)
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