Health Care Talk (HCTalk.com)

[Denver Dave]

Prescription for health reform
Colorado commission offers recommendations
By Bill Lindsay guest commentary
Posted: 02/21/2010 01:00:00 AM MST
http://www.denverpost.com/search/ci_14429867

Comprehensive health care reform appears to have stalled at the federal level. However, this does not mean that nothing can move forward. There are the options that should be considered.

In preparing its recommendation to the Colorado General Assembly, Colorado's Blue Ribbon Commission for Health Care Reform understood that putting more people into an inefficient system would raise costs. The commission thought that if the revisions needed for improving efficiency were implemented first, then the actual savings that would result could be used to pay for the expansion of desired eligibility and enrollment aspects of health care reform.

[JohnJ]

Re: Prescription for health reform, guest commentary by Bill Lindsay,
02/21/10:

Bill Lindsay, who served as chair of the Colorado Blue Ribbon Commission for Health Care Reform, notes that we cannot walk away from health care reform. I fully agree. Mr. Lindsay promotes several reform recommendations from the Blue Ribbon Commission, some more noteworthy than others. What he left out of his commentary, however, was that the Blue Ribbon Commission analyzed 5 different proposals for comprehensive health care reform in Colorado. Only the single-payer proposal insured all Coloradans and saved money, providing
comprehensive health care benefits at a savings of $ 1.4 Billon per year. A prescription for reform that ignores the single-payer solution sidesteps the legacy of the private insurance industry – a legacy that extracts large
amounts of money and resources from the health care financing system while providing little value to consumers. Single-payer health care reform is a fiscally conservative solution that will enhance our ability to compete economically with all other industrialized nations who ensure their citizens universal access to health care at a much lower cost.

John Valvano is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and a member of Health Care
for All Colorado