June 17th, 2008

Mark Stier, health care campaign manager for the Service Employees International Union’s Pennsylvania State Council, explains in his As I see it, Patriot-News column today why the Republicans HealthNET PA plan won’t be adaquate to help the uninsured – if it even works at all. 

He points out that the Senate R’s have sat on the House D’s Pennsylvania Access to Basic Care (PA ABC) plan — which would extend state-subsidized health insurance to about 275,000 of the state’s uninsured – in committee for the last three months, only to reveal their own haphazard plan just two weeks before the state’s budget plan is due.

Instead of directly helping the uninsured gain access to insurance as PA ABC does, Stier states, the GOP’s plan aims to set up more free-clinics and a network of voluntary physicians to treat the state’s poor and uninsured.  This won’t work, because even if uninsured gain access to these clinics, their quality of care will be poor.  They will have to wait in long lines to be seen and won’t have access to medical screenings and tests.  While wrangling through a complicated system with various components, Stier points out that the HealthNET proposal will do far less for the uninsured than PA ABC – while spending almost as much.

Stier points out that the best way to help the uninsured is to get them insurance – which the Democrats plan does.  And PA ABC rightfully requires the families being insured to pay a part of the premium, based on a sliding income scale.  He points out that the Senate GOP plan does have some great components, helping funding electronic medical records and allowing parents to insure children up until age 30.  The best idea, he says, is to funnel the Republicans useful HealthNET PA components into the PA ABC plan and pass the compromise before lawmakers leave for summer reccess.