Simply Revolutionary
Health act starting to gain attention it deserves
Phoenix, AZ,
Jul 28, 2005 -
For a time it seemed we were a voice in the wilderness regarding the potential value of the Health Care Choice Act drafted by Rep. John Shadegg, R-Ariz. For months, detractors have dismissed the legislation as a simple-minded response to a complex problem. Now that Shadegg's little free-market proposal is gaining steam in Congress, though, others are beginning to recognize the idea for what it is: Simply revolutionary. Despite furious opposition from a health care industry stocked with special interests, the Choice Act passed the House Energy and Commerce Committee last week, albeit by a party-line 24-23 vote. It enjoys the increasingly enthusiastic support of the White House. And just this week, the Wall Street Journal's editorial board joined us in singing the legislation's praises. Indeed, Journal board members were fairly leaping out of their chairs, observing: "It's no exaggeration to say this could turn out to be the most humane and consequential domestic achievement of the Bush years." Hyperbole? Only if you take Shadegg's legislation, which attends to a modest sector of the health care market, at face value. It is designed to help the most disabused segment of the market, individual buyers. A relatively small market, that. But taken as a harbinger of things to come, the revolution inherent in Shadegg's Choice Act becomes more apparent. If successful, it could help redirect the nation's health care industry away from its sclerotic 60-year-old obsession with group coverages and toward a future in which individuals choose what coverage they wish. The Health Care Choice Act instructs us that there is an option beyond the mind-bending complexities of the current, heavily regulated system. It tells us, too, that the only available option to the current mess doesn't have to be government-controlled Euro-care. Shadegg's Choice Act would permit individual buyers of insurance to go outside their home state to seek coverage. Because many states require insurers to provide certain coverages - chiropractic services, for example - the average cost to a single person seeking coverage varies wildly. In New Jersey, for example, the average individual buyer pays $4,000 annually. In neighboring Pennsylvania, the cost is less than $1,500. And in many states, the basic cost is far less than that. An estimated 45 million Americans lack insurance protection, and for at least two-thirds of them the major impediment is cost. "If without the mandates they have some form of coverage, isn't that good?" Shadegg asks. Yes, it is. What is also good is that the Health Care Choice Act would represent a second big step - health care savings accounts being the first - toward increasing the individual's control of medical coverage. There is a way out of the current, costly health-care mess. And it isn't letting Uncle Sam take over. It's taking the reins ourselves.
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