Candidates, Experts Discuss Health Care Reform at Forum

The congress may not address health care next year focusing on the economy. However, it's importance to address health care costs and rising prescription drug prices with decreasing number of Americans without affordable health insurance coverage or being totally uninsured.

Advisers to the three major presidential candidates, as well as health care analysts and pollsters, on Tuesday at a forum discussed the prospects for the health reform, CQ HealthBeat reports. At the forum, hosted by the journal Health Affairs, Congressional Budget Office Director Peter Orszag said that Congress might not address health care next year because lawmakers will have to focus on the economy. He also highlighted the importance of addressing health care costs (Reichard, CQ HealthBeat, 5/13).

David Blumenthal, an adviser to Democratic candidate Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.), said, "The candidates, at least on the Democratic side, care deeply" about health care, adding, "If there's any way to get to it, I'm confident they will get to it." Jeanne Lambrew, health care adviser to Democratic candidate Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y.), said that Clinton would make health care her top domestic priority and that reforming the health system is consistent with a desire to stimulate the economy.

Douglas Holtz-Eakin, senior policy adviser to presumptive Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), called health care "an economic issue" that requires action as early as possible. He said, "I don't think it will be taken over by events. It's a pressing issue, and action is required." The "actual march will be a day-to-day kind of affair that will require continuous incremental changes," Holtz-Eakin said, adding, "You can't build a consensus about all of health care" (Koffler, CongressDaily, 5/13).

Democratic pollster Celinda Lake said that the U.S. has a "unique" opportunity to address health care next year because "coalitions being built in favor of major health reform at the state and national levels are unprecedented in their breadth and influence." Republican pollster William McInturff agreed. However, residents would not accept an expansion of health insurance if it meant less health care for themselves, he said (CQ HealthBeat, 5/13).

A webcast of the forum is available online at health08.org.

West Virginia Primary
Clinton on Tuesday won the West Virginia Democratic primary with 67% of the vote, compared with 26% for Obama, CNN.com reports.

According to an exit poll, 15% percent of West Virginia Democratic primary voters cited health care as their most important issue in the election, compared with 64% who cited the economy and 17% who cited the war in Iraq. Among those voters, 68% supported Clinton, and 23% favored Obama, the poll found (CNN.com, 5/14). The poll, conducted by Edison Media Research and Mitofsky International, included responses from 1,478 West Virginia Democratic primary voters in 30 precincts and had a margin of sampling error of plus or minus four percentage points (Fram, AP/Chicago Tribune, 5/13).

Opinion Piece
"It's been a blast, this presidential campaign," but "no one should think it's been honest" because the campaign has "been an exercise in mass merchandising" in which the candidates make "alluring promises" and offer "freebies" on health care and other issues, Washington Post columnist Robert Samuelson writes. He adds, "There is a vast gap between the country's problems and the candidates' agenda and rhetoric."

According to Samuelson, a "candidate inoculated with truth serum" might make "upsetting" acknowledgements, such as the need to reduce spending on Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security and increase the eligibility age for the programs. Samuelson writes, "Almost all our major national problems require patience," but politics is "mostly about immediate gratification," adding, "Is it any wonder that our genuine problems persist year after year, and in the end, foster public cynicism?" (Samuelson, Washington Post, 5/14).