OPINION: EDITORIAL: Health care reform dysfunction hard to swallow
Eating away at our "greatest nation on earth" mantra is the fact our people are suffering. Many can't afford medical insurance, and they delay going to the doctor because they haven't the money to pay for treatment. Preventive care? Forget about it.
Those of us who do have health insurance increasingly pull more greenbacks from our wallet to pay high premiums and hefty deductibles.
Pity, because we won't be able to afford the mental health care to help us deal with our angst over the situation.
We are not alone in our frustration. Health care providers, insurance agents and many more are being swept up, too, in the
Our decades-long struggle to put in place a broad health care system came into being with the Affordable Care Act, but the partisan measure --
But instead of treating it as a foundation on which to build,
Trouble is, they can't gather any more momentum than a turkey trying to stay aloft.
First, candidate
A
Reform strategy has run the gamut, from:
--repeal and replace with a brand spankin' new
--let Obamacare fail, then come up with a plan, to
--repeal and delay, the thinking being that if lawmakers have a couple more years to figure it out, they'll come up with a plan.
This swirl of dysfunction is giving Americans a headache -- and we can't even afford the meds to make it go away.
But we can let those elected to serve us in
Provisions must include:
--Reduced treatment costs,
--Lower prescription drug prices,
--Access to preventive care, and
--Coverage of pre-existing conditions.
That's just the start. Hospitals and clinics should focus more on patients and less on who pays, insurance companies must make the claims process less cumbersome, and pharmaceutical firms have to stop getting rich off pill prices.
Meaningful change, though, begins with our elected pathfinders in
-- The News and Tribune editorial board is comprised of Publisher
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