President Trump has put forth his ideas on how to fix the broken ObamaCare healthcare system. The Democrats aren’t interested in solutions to ObamaCare for two reasons; ObamaCare is their baby, passed without a single Republican vote in 2010, so they don’t want to admit they made any mistakes. Second, their goal is full government control of healthcare – socialized medicine – and ObamaCare comes closest to that goal of any U.S healthcare system.
But ObamaCare is an absolute failure, requiring additional government subsidies to keep it affordable regardless of President Obama’s promises it would lower the cost of healthcare. But rather than fix the problems, Democrats only want to throw more government money, (that’s your money and mine) as a temporary solution.
This means Republicans are fighting an uphill battle to improve the system since they can’t count on the support of Democrats. But Trump is putting forth his ideas for solutions so Democrats can’t say he doesn’t have any. The American people can decide who is better to trust with their healthcare.
Natalie Andrews and Sabrina Siddiqui, writing for The Wall Street Journal, say, “The White House released a healthcare framework on Thursday, called “The Great Healthcare Plan,” which seeks to lower prescription drug prices, increase price transparency and redirect federal subsidies from insurers to consumers. Passing the proposal into law is expected to be a tall order for a gridlocked Washington that has struggled for months to agree on a healthcare compromise aimed at easing higher premiums and other costs for millions of Americans.
The plan brings together ideas that have been pitched by several lawmakers and asks Congress to codify executive actions designed to bring U.S. drug prices in line with the lowest level paid by other rich countries. The plan wouldn’t replace the Affordable Care Act, which many Republicans campaigned on repealing. White House officials said the measures would give more power to consumers if all the proposals were passed.
The framework is light on details and doesn’t endorse specific bills or give a timeline for when Trump wants it passed. But it does seek to codify many of the actions Trump has taken on addressing healthcare costs. The proposal doesn’t endorse extending enhanced Obamacare subsidies, which expired in December. Rather than paying insurers through the subsidies, Trump’s plan would instead deposit those funds directly into a savings account, similar to a Health Savings Account, and implement a cost-sharing reduction program.
“Instead of putting the needs of big corporations and special interests first, our plan finally puts you first and puts more money in your pocket,” Trump said in a video posted on the White House’s social-media accounts. “The big insurance companies lose and the people of our country win.” The plan calls for price transparency, urging “any healthcare provider or insurer who accepts Medicare or Medicaid to prominently post their pricing and fees.” Price transparency bills in Congress have support from Republicans and Democrats.
Trump’s plan seeks to “end kickbacks from pharmacy-benefit managers to the large brokerage middlemen” to lower costs. Lawmakers from both parties have criticized pharmacy-benefit managers, which usually play a key role in getting prescriptions filled and reimbursed, for what the administration says is anticompetitive tactics that keep drug prices artificially high.
Some Republicans have openly called for more engagement from Trump, who has largely stayed out of the debate and received conflicting advice from aides on how to approach the subsidies. The president and his party have found themselves caught between fears that voters will punish Republicans if healthcare costs skyrocket in a midterm year defined by affordability—and concerns that backing any measure tied to the Obamacare healthcare law could spark backlash from a conservative base that has long opposed it.
The American people need to understand that Democrats are moving to take away your private insurance policy and force everyone onto a government-controlled healthcare system. That means socialized medicine and that always leads to restricted access to care, rationing of care, and denial of expensive treatments to those not considered worthy of the expense by the government. No one should be forced to accept such a system.
