Mark Leno’s single payer bill, SB 810, cleared the Senate today.
The California Senate approved creating a government-run health care system for the nation’s most populous state on Thursday, ignoring a veto threat from Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Supporters said it is time for state legislatures to take up the debate as the Obama Administration’s national health care proposal falters in Congress.
“If it’s not to be done at the national level, let us take the lead,” said state Sen. Christine Kehoe, D-San Diego. (LA Times)
Of course the Republicans, and the media, are framing this as some sort of madness in the face of the Massachusetts senate vote. Yet, the fact of the matter is that a big portion of the vote that swung from voting for President Obama to Scott Brown were people disaffected from the fact that the government couldn’t pass meaningful health care. As Rep. George Miller pointed out, in the wake of that election, we must be more aggressive in pursuing health care options.
Of course, Arnold Schwarzenegger is going to veto this bill, and everybody knows it. The Republicans are going around screaming about $200 Billion, but that number is what we are already spending on health care. Were we to adopt a single payer system, we would shed about 30% of those costs over night in the form of the insurance companies. We would increase health outcomes and save money.
But the Republicans are too busy telling us how we should be scared of the future to pretend to care about what’s happening to the ever-increasing working poor of this state. Single payer is about a basic fairness that allows all Californians health care that saves the taxpayers money. Take that to the blood bank and the bank bank.
Figure out what can be improved from the MA system and go from there. Fix the weaknesses of the MA system so it can be immune to challenge.
Will we have budget overruns?
Will the poor have to pay co-pays and stuff that will limit health care?
Will premiums rise just as fast as private insurance instead of single payer?
I am not going thru a chamber of commerce website for these concerns, but actually public citizen’s own website?
This is it people. If the Governator doesn’t sign it, find push it through again with a Democrat in power. We need to show this country that new ways of doing things and thinking is nothing to be scared off.
The Mass system IS the Health Care Reform that Congress and Obama are trying to push. It sucks, it has no forms of cost control, ask anybody that runs the system. Yes they get 90+% coverage but what they don’t tell you is that the fines for not having insurance are less than actually paying for insurance so most younger people pay the fine and opt out, unless they need it.
This increases cost on those you need it most.
By having True Single Payer like in Britain but with privately owned Hospitals and Clinics, the State can set the rates and the terms of minimum coverage which is unknown currently in the final Congress bill. You can control cost by paying doctors fairly and on-time and protecting consumers from higher drug cost, by again setting the rules.
Its the least expensive way to do Health Care overall, but also makes the Government active in trying to improve the overall lives of citizens.
That can be good or bad, depending how many bad habits you have…