USA Today dove head first today into the increasingly crowded pool of newspapers who are taking a stand for fixing our nation's broken health care system.
The paper examines one key piece of Obama's health care proposal--offering a public plan that would compete with private insurers to provide the best services and benefits at a competitive cost to consumers. The editorial staff of USA Today expertly unravels the conservative arguments against a public option, exposing the contradiction between "a public health plan will never be able to compete with private insurance plans," and "a government plan will be so strong that it will destroy private health insurance."
The paper writes, "[Obama's] plan is a compelling idea for the simple reason that it tests the notion that private health insurance plans operate more efficiently than government." My guess is that some insurers doubt the strength of their own plans. Too many people have experienced what has become part-and-parcel of our broken health care system: denial of coverage, unpaid claims, and confusing bureaucracy.
Furthermore, the editorial reminds us that taxpayers are already financing a public health plan. "Government already accounts for about 46% of all U.S. health spending," the paper reports, acknowledging that "the nation is already halfway there, and those who have it - Medicare recipients most notably - seem to like it."
Regardless of what plan makes it into a final health care reform bill, the message is clear: as unemployment rises and more people face losing their coverage, the new Congress must address this crisis immediately. The paper concludes, "...Why not let people pick the plan they like? If commercial coverage becomes unaffordable to all but the few, the future of private insurance will be the least of everybody's concerns."
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