The Health Care Fight is Far from Over

While most Americans were enjoying Christmas, the Senate Democrats were able to jam through their health care bill. Republicans fought hard to improve the bill and instill in it some real reform to improve the health care system for all Americans, but at the end of the day we simply didn’t have the votes to stop this train wreck. However, all is not lost.

A clear majority of Americans oppose this bill, even before the hidden details and secret deals were brought to light. This is not because they are against change or think our current health care system is perfect. They oppose it because they know the Democrats’ plan is far more expensive than we can afford, creates far more government bureaucracy than we need, and does very little to lower costs and improve care.

The instincts of the American people are right on target. This is a flawed bill and it must, and still can, be stopped.

Under the Senate-passed bill, health insurance premiums will go up because of the bill’s fees and taxes. These taxes, a total of $518 billion over the next 10 years, start rising immediately, and insurance companies and other health care providers will pass those costs right along to consumers. Most of the benefits, for those who actually qualify, won’t kick in fully for another four years.

In some cases, employers will stop offering health insurance because of the new requirements and higher costs. Millions of Americans will be dropped from the coverage of their choosing and shoved into a new “insurance exchange.”

Despite spending $2.3 trillion, there will still be 23 million uninsured Americans. And many of the uninsured who do get coverage will be placed into Medicaid, a government-run program that works so poorly that nearly half of all doctors won’t even accept patients covered by it.

This increase in Medicaid and other programs will also force states already facing enormous budget shortfalls to go another $26 billion into the red. Americans will begin to see cutbacks to other essential state services like education, law enforcement, and roads, or higher state taxes to make up the deficit.

Of course, a few lucky states were able to win a little money back, thanks to last-minute sweetheart deals that were slipped into the bill’s 2,700 pages. Despite claims that the days of politics-as-usual were over, Democrats showed that their only solution to forcing unpopular legislation on the American people was through buying votes with backroom deals and pork-barrel politics.

There is much that must be improved in our health care system, especially when it comes to preserving quality while controlling costs. My Republican colleagues and I put forward numerous proposals in an attempt to achieve better and cheaper ways to achieve real reform.

However, in the end we are left with a tragically flawed, enormously bloated bill that does too little to help most Americans. This is not the true reform the American people were hoping for and had a right to expect.

There is still time to stop this bill. Democrats are working behind closed doors to merge the House and Senate bills. As they cobble together more sweetheart deals, it is vital that Americans let their voices be heard. The White House and Congressional Democrats need to hear from individuals, families and business owners who have justified concerns that this bill will increase costs while leaving our health care system in worse shape than it already is.

There is still time to scrap this flawed legislation and work to find a bipartisan solution that will lower health care costs and improve the quality of care.

U.S. Senator John Thune's full bio can be found here.