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Health Care Reform Relegated to Waiting Room, With Bush's Re-Election

Posted on: Wednesday, 3 November 2004, 21:00 CST

Nov. 4--Universal health care is out of the question -- at least for the next four years -- as a result of the re-election of President Bush.

Meanwhile, insurance consultants expect an expansion of consumer-driven health care plans that require employees to pay more for their health care.

President Bush advocates market solutions for the ailing health care system, which has left 45 million people without health insurance. He has proposed tax breaks for businesses and low-income individuals to encourage them to open health savings accounts, which would be used to pay care costs.

Forrester Research, a Cambridge, Mass.-based research company, predicts consumer driven health care plan enrollments will rise from a small percentage of the commercial market today to 12 percent in 2008. Forrester estimates that such plans could reach nearly one-quarter of the market by 2010.

The major hurdle to an expansion of consumer-driven health care is the lack of information that patients can use to select where they receive care, experts agree.

Tim Cullen, senior vice president of Blue Cross Blue Shield of Wisconsin, said the private sector has four years to fix the health system. If that does not happen, presidential candidates in 2008, regardless of party affiliation, will propose programs that provide health care to all Americans while raising taxes to pay for it, Cullen said.

"We have to share cost and quality data with clients," Cullen said. "We know more about buying a TV than buying our health care."

If the private sector fails to repair the health care system and slow soaring costs, businesses would "throw in the towel" and ask the government to take over paying for health care, Cullen predicted.

Price and quality information are in short supply in today's consumer-drive marketplace, said David Osterndorf, senior health care consultant with Towers Perrin, a human resources consulting group.

Osterndorf also envisions a day when physicians are required treat patients in accordance with "best practices" protocols. Now, physicians are free to provide care to patients in any manner they see fit, he said.

As competitive forces increase, physicians will need to make sure they are offering the best care at the best prices, he said.

Osterndorf also sees the growth of association health plans that small employers can join to improve their leverage in purchasing health care.

"Both presidential candidates had correctly identified health care costs as a key issue the country has to address," said Larry Rambo, Humana's chief executive officer for Wisconsin and Michigan.

Regardless of the election, consumer-drive health care is a concept whose time has come, he said.

"We see continued building of momentum in that direction which we believe will be a positive step in getting control of the rate of increases in health care costs," Rambo said.

Steve Brenton, president of the Wisconsin Hospital Association, fears cuts in Medicaid and Medicare funding under a Bush Administration -- cuts that could force hospitals to charge other patients more to make up for shortfalls.

"With the budget deficits we are facing there will be a lot of interest in reducing that deficit and Medicare and Medicaid are on the table," he said.

"The hospital industry will try to make its case to avoid those cuts."

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(c) 2004, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News. For information on republishing this content, contact us at (800) 661-2511 (U.S.), (213) 237-4914 (worldwide), fax (213) 237-6515, or e-mail reprints@krtinfo.com.

Source: The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

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