Issue Position: Guaranteeing Health Care for All Americans

Issue Position

Access to high quality affordable health care should be the right of every American. But the spiraling costs of health care are crippling our businesses and putting an incredible strain on families facing financial ruin if someone loses their job or gets sick.

The health care system we currently have focuses on the wrong priorities, putting the profits of the big drug and insurance companies before the health of patients. We need to turn that around, returning the focus of our health care system to patients and their doctors, not big corporate interests.

One of my first priorities in Washington will be making sure that every American has access to affordable, high-quality health care and the choice of a family doctor they trust, a plan they choose, and coverage that can't be taken away if someone changes jobs or gets laid off.

No one can promise that sending one new person to Congress will achieve this level of universal coverage over night. That's not going to happen. But if we send the right kinds of people there - leaders committed to getting started on day one, standing up to the special interests and speaking out for working families - we'll get there.

And we're going to do that by reducing costs, expanding on what works, providing help for small businesses, and giving all Americans access to the same type of coverage Congress receives:

Reduce Costs. The high cost of health care in this country is great if you're the CEO of a company that makes the medicine we rely on, or sit on the board of an insurance company making record profits. But it's devastating for the everyday families and small businesses that depend on it. Making health care more accessible means making it more affordable:

* Lower Rx Drug Costs. We must allow the government to use its purchasing power to negotiate for lower drug costs and permit the re-importation of safe, proven medicine from countries like Canada. Drug companies are charging Americans twice as much for the same medicine they sell in Europe and Canada. Our government is letting them get away with it, and that's wrong. Lower prices will lead to lower premiums.

* Emphasize Prevention. It costs less to keep someone from getting sick than to treat them after they've fallen ill.

* Modernize Our Medicine. We can eliminate bureaucratic waste by implementing cost-saving mechanisms such as electronic records and delivery.

Expand On What Works. SCHIP (known as MIchild here in Michigan) and Medicaid are the all too rare examples of government programs that work. Rather than cutting them as President Bush and Congressman Knollenberg would do, we should be expanding them to extend the promise of affordable care to Michigan children and families.

Help For Small Businesses. The small businessmen I talk to as I travel Oakland County want to do the right thing by their employees. They want to provide health care, but the costs are so high they can't afford to. Small businesses like these should be our partners, and the government should be helping them do the right thing by offering tax credits for businesses that offer health care to their employees and helping them to lower their costs and increase their purchasing power by giving them the option to join together and buy their insurance together.

Open the Congressional Model To All Americans. Our tax dollars pay for Members of Congress and their families to have access to the best health care coverage available, offering choices of modern benefits and private plans, providing comprehensive information to enrollees, and controlling costs while constantly improving benefits and enjoying wide popularity. There's no reason this model can't be expanded and opened to all Americans, and I look forward to working with a new Democratic President to make that a reality.

Affordable health care that's accessible to everyone is critical to the health of Michigan's families and essential to the competitiveness of our businesses. It means standing up to the special interests and speaking out for working families. We're going to have to work together, one step at a time, and we're not going to get there over night. But we'll get there - we can't afford not to.

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