It seems that the public option for health insurance coverage is steadily being pushed out from the government's health care reform plan as opponents of public option are showing more power and lobbying harder. The administration is backing away from the public health insurance option as Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius tells CNN that government-run insurance is "not the essential element" of healthcare overhaul.
Both Obama and his Health Secretary Sebelius have stressed that there has to be a mechanism that competes with private health insurance providers. They still hope there will be a system in which there will be competition to private insurers. "I think there will be a competition to private insurers," Sebelius said. "That really is the essential part, that you don’t turn over the whole new marketplace to private insurance companies and trust them to do the right thing."
Sebelius' position was today paralleled by Robert Gibbs, the president’s press secretary. Speaking of public option, he told CBS's "Face the Nation" that "the bottom line for this for the president is, what we have to have is choice and competition in the insurance market."
According to L.A. Times, a day earlier, the president himself said that "the public option, whether we have it or don't have it, is not the entirety of healthcare reform." Basically the administration is saying now that the health care reform is possible without a government-run health insurance option, known as public option. The position may or could win the Obama Administration and the Democrats the necessary support to reach a health care reform. Currently, according to Senator Conrad, there are not enough votes in the Senate to pass a reform based on public health insurance option.
Instead, Senator Conrad proposes health insurance cooperatives as another alternative. "Back in June, Sen. Kent Conrad (D-ND) raised the proposal of a nonprofit health insurance cooperative to replace a public health care plan," writes eMaxhealth. Based on his proposal, the health insurance cooperatives receive initial federal funding, but operate independently of government and should have the same financial reserves to private companies to help meet unexpected costs. Perhaps this mechanism may create the desired competition that Secretary Sebelius and Gibbs meant today.
Many Americans had cheered and had welcomed the public health insurance option, hoping it would create affordable health insurance plans for more than 46 million Americans. Now I can see the disappointment already voiced online. "Some opponents to public option obviously have never lost a job, or aren't small business owners or are uninsurable," tweets CharlotteAsh.
We knew this was coming. Anyone wondering why medication costs are so high might be interested in knowing that drug companies spent forty million dollars in the last three months lobbying Congress about health care. How much the health insurance industry has spent on lobbying.
Another tweet reads that the writer's "willingness to vote for US Democrats in 2010/2012 is dependent on Public Option for Health Insurance. Otherwise - third parties."
The fact is that both opponents and the proponents of the health care reform exploit the fears and concerns of the people to take political advantage. However, as the president said, in the end, the Government and the Congress will achieve the necessary consensus and approve the reform.
Written by Armen Hareyan
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