AFFORDABLE AND ACCESSIBLE HEALTHCARE
“We have people who pay more and more for health care and are getting less and less; while others pay less and less and are getting more and more. The system is clearly not working.” – Peggy
There are so many who cannot afford their insurance premiums, and deductibles are so high they can’t even use their insurance anyway. Individual and family budgets are already stretched to the limit with the high costs of housing, childcare, power bills, ever ballooning property taxes, and even the simple task of purchasing now expensive license tabs. A parent struggles with the need to bring their sick child to the doctor, and they know they can’t afford it. How does one choose between bringing your child to the doctor and paying your power bill to keep the heat and lights on?
Healthcare access is a significant problem. It’s becoming increasingly difficult to find providers and wait times are often long. Rural residents are watching the consolidation of their health services every year. Residents must drive farther and farther for everything – from the biopsy of a mole to baby delivery. It’s not safe and it’s not right.
The Affordable Care Act (aka “Obamacare”) has been a disaster for everyone. Our government continues to pour in supplemental funding to prop up this failed system, and that’s not working either. For years we have been nibbling around the edges. We are funneling increasingly more tax dollars into programs that are so inefficient that most of the funding is wasted and fails to accomplish its objectives. Everything continues to get worse and yet we keep doing the same things over and over.
We must start thinking outside the box, get radical, and pursue innovation when it comes to fixing healthcare in this state. If we don’t, our healthcare system will collapse. Although the Affordable Care Act has many restrictive mandates, states can seek waivers from the federal government to innovate. I don’t understand why our current administration has not already done this, but it’s what I intend to do. In addition, there are actions Minnesota can take immediately which have been proven in other states to make quality health care more accessible and affordable. I will begin working on these actions day one.
Minnesota used to be known as a leader in healthcare. Let’s be a Minnesota healthcare leader again and lead the charge!
PROBLEM: Waivers needed for innovation…
The Affordable Care Act has many restrictive mandates. However, states can seek waivers from the federal government. Below are some waivers I will request to lower costs and increase access.
SOLUTION:
- More insurance choice to create lower costs. We must stop treating everyone the same by locking every individual into the same insurance plans and coverage no matter age, sex, health, or lifestyle. Why should people have to pay for something they don’t need or want? I will apply for a federal waiver to give individuals more insurance plan choices to fit individual lifestyle and health needs.
- Larger insurance pools create lower costs. I will direct the MN Department of Commerce to allow for the creation of bigger insurance pools (trade associations, small business groups, farmer co-ops, etc.) so groups can form their own insurance pools.
- Lower health care costs by seeking new and innovative ways to pay for health care. Seek federal waivers to allow for direct contracting with hospitals for certain services instead of going through insurance companies. For example, combat the continued heavy and expensive use of Emergency Rooms for non-emergency care by contracting directly with providers to create combination ER and Urgent Care to lower costs.
- Explore innovative ideas to address catastrophic health care needs and high-risk health individuals with the goal of both high-quality care and affordable insurance plans.
PROBLEM: Innovative health care solutions we can do right now…
Below are actions Minnesota can make without federal waivers. Some other states have enacted many of these strategies to one extent or another and have proven they can lower costs and increase access. I will take immediate action on these.
SOLUTION:
- Lower healthcare costs: Continue to build upon Minnesota’s price transparency laws by expanding and strengthening them and making sure health care providers are compliant.
- Lower healthcare costs: Examine the Health Care Access Fund “sick tax” that everyone pays for every medical or dental treatment. Either return it to what it was created for or repeal it.
- Increase access and local control: Direct the MN Department of Health to assess the outdated Certificate of Need (CON) approval processes and implement significant CON reform to eliminate unnecessary obstacles to increasing care opportunities in communities. Providers and communities should determine whether to build or expand facilities and services – not government bureaucrats.
- Improve healthcare worker shortage: Increase Minnesota’s participation in Interstate Compacts for health care professionals to encourage more out-of-state professionals to locate here. Though our state has made some strides in this area, it’s still a costly and lengthy process that inhibits many health care professionals from relocating here.
- Improve healthcare worker shortage: Direct the Department of Health to evaluate the current regulatory licensing burden for each health care profession and present to the legislature recommendations to ease licensing burdens across the board for all health care professions.
- Increase access and local control: Create a simple definition for what Direct Primary Care (DPC) is and states that DPC is not insurance (it’s not) to make it easier for DPC to locate in Minnesota communities.
- Provider and patient freedom: Reduce insurance delays so patients can get the medication they need by exempting doctors with high prior authorization rates from burdensome constraints. These “gold card” laws have been passed in many other states and have been successful in providing a process to allow trusted and experienced physicians to bypass the prior authorization process.
- Provider and patient freedom: Work with the legislature to create laws that protect the ability of physicians to prescribe FDA-approved medications off-label for their patients and to protect the free speech and rights of medical professionals who challenge the effectiveness of treatments or recommendations made by government or other entities.
- Stop wasting our tax dollars: Pass the “I’m not a robot” bill to stop the hundreds of millions of Medicaid dollars wasted every year in Minnesota through fraud and lackadaisical state oversight. This legislation would require common sense eligibility checks before insurance companies can issue Medicaid payments. These companies would be required to contact the enrollee and get a minimal amount of information to prevent tax dollars from being spent on people who live outside Minnesota, are on a different private or public plan, or are dead. Who wouldn’t support this?
- Stop wasting our tax dollars: Agency employees who don’t do their jobs in overseeing these health care funds will be held accountable like any other employee in the private sector. There will be consequences for not doing one’s job.
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