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Health Care

Every Minnesotan should have access to affordable, high quality medical care. But how can we achieve that goal? In the richest nation on earth and one of the most prosperous states, many Minnesotans are still uninsured and underinsured. Even families with good jobs and good coverage are suffering from health care insecurity. They worry what will happen if they lose or change jobs, or if their employer drops their coverage. No one should lie awake at night wondering how he or she will pay for essential medical care.

The cost of health care and health insurance continues to increase each year in Minnesota. Families are spending more of their budget in order to provide basic health care coverage as employers shift the costs to their employees in the form of higher premiums, co-pays and deductibles.

Small business owners tell me that they want to provide health insurance for their employees, but the cost is prohibitive. In our community, small employers compete for employees with Mayo Clinic, IBM and other large employers. An employee often seeks a job with a small company—which can't provide health benefits—while waiting for another job—with health insurance—to open up. The result is a continuous employee drain.

The cost of health care is also a serious concern in our state budget, because the state helps pay the bills for many low-income people, especially indigent elderly and disabled Minnesotans in residential care, not to mention the rising insurance costs of state employees.

Our health care system—if it is a system at all—is enormously complex, so we must address the problems on many fronts. While some solutions must come at the federal level, Minnesota can address many problems right here. All we need is the political will to do it.

I support efforts to allow businesses to pool resources so they can offer reduced costs to employees while maintaining your family’s choice in health care coverage. Even better, Minnesota should open its MinnesotaCare program and State Employee Healthy Plans to buy-in from small businesses and individuals. These businesses and individuals would pay their own way but benefit from the reduced costs that come from a large pool of enrollees.

Covering everyone would hold down overall costs. That's because scheduled services from a primary care provider cost far less that care in the emergency room. When people cannot afford medical care, they may wait until they are quite ill before coming to an emergency room. When the bills for emergency room care go unpaid, they must be covered by counties (and paid out of property taxes) or absorbed by the hospital and ultimately shifted to other patients. Common sense also tells us that workers are more productive when they receive care for minor health concerns before they become debilitating.

While medical care is important, we must recognize that the greatest improvements in the health of our population come through public health measures. Clean water, clean air and a safe and healthy food supply are vitally important, as is exercise and community measures that discourage smoking. A focus on prevention will help hold down medical costs in the long term.

Medicare Part D is a federal program that affects many Minnesota patients. Is confusing, wasteful, and does nothing to control the price of drugs overall. Instead of following the Medicare "single payer" model, Congress put drug coverage in the hands of multiple private insurers. (Medicare itself has the lowest overhead in the health insurance business.) Even worse, the new law prohibits the federal government from using its buying power to get better prices from drug companies. No wonder so many seniors say Medicare Part D deserves the grade of "D".

The startup to the Medicare Part D program was bumpy. Due to computer glitches, some seniors went to the pharmacy to get their medications but went home without them when their names did not show up in the computers. I was pleased to vote to approve state funding to provide these medications on an emergency basis. The state expects that the federal government will reimburse those funds.

With two of our area's health care experts retiring from the legislature this year, Rochester needs a new expert voice in health policy. When re-elected I will work to be that voice. Most of you know that I am an attorney, but many don't know that I also earned a Masters Degree in Public Health.  I will ask to serve on the Health Care Committee in the House for 2007-2008 and continue to work hard for our community and our state.  

I will keep working to provide affordable coverage to every Minnesotan.