Issue Position: Healthcare

Issue Position

Healthcare providers must use technology, not only to improve care, but also to reduce costs

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010

The Act has many good points including requiring Insurance Companies to be less heartless, and encouraging the Health Care Community to be more cost effective while improving results.

Critics of the Act cite the cost as unaffordable so it should be repealed. I believe we need to use the Act as the starting point and improve it. Nothing is perfect the first time. We can not, as nation, abandon the principles written in the declaration of independence "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." How is this possible without access to affordable health care?

The key to affordable health care, as well as one of the keys to reducing the deficit, is to change conventional wisdom that health care costs are going to rise more than the rate of inflation. Instead, the expectation should be health care costs are going to decline through the use of technology and best business practices.

We need to recognize that there is little real competition in the industry. Insurance companies, hospitals, drug companies, and to some degree doctors are oligopolies. Consumers have little choice since, in most cases, their health care needs are not elective. To use an economic term demand is inelastic, or the consumer will choose to get the service regardless of cost.

I believe health care institutions must be pressured to make reductions in health care costs. And I believe that can be done without excessive government regulations. But it will not occur unless the people through their government set this expectation.

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