Issue Position: Health Care

Issue Position

One of the most difficult problems for business especially small businesses is the cost of health insurance. Most small employers are unable to provide health care insurance for employees. For many people this means working one or more jobs to sustain a family and not being able to provide health insurance for the family. For those who are not working health care may be totally out of reach. In Delaware almost three-quarters (74%) of Delaware's uninsured belong to families with at least one full-time worker. Many uninsured Delawareans are not offered benefits through their jobs or cannot afford employer sponsored or individual health coverage. According to the Delaware Health Care Commission, an estimated 105,000 Delawareans have no health care coverage. Delaware's uninsured population grew by over 10 percent, from 95,000 to 105,000 people. And between 2000 and 2005, Delaware experienced the fourth-highest increase of uninsured residents in the country. Inadequate health care is a very serious and costly problem. Helping people to maintain health is must less of a drain on the State than the cost to provide health care once they are seriously debilitated. The general public pays for this through increased hospital cost to cover the uninsured and increases in the Medicaid population.
. Affordable health care needs to be provided for all Delawareans
. There needs to be some control on the increase cost for health care services
. Focus needs to be placed on preventative and wellness programs

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