Health Care Reform – Three different themes
Three reports this week about the costs of health care and health care reform caught my attention. One said that health care reform will be a sure fire economic stimulus because it will replace jobs lost from the current recession. Another suggests that a modest upfront investment will produce $530 billion in savings. The third moans that without a commitment to hard choices, we are doomed to health care spending profligacy.
John Nichols in The Nation describes a report and follow-on campaign by the National Nurses Organizing Committee/California Nurses Association (NNOC/CAN) that attempts to bolster the argument for a Single Payer health care system by describing its impact on jobs and the economy.
A report in Reuters describes a report by DeLoitte that argues that a $220 billion investment in e-prescribing and electronic medical records will produce $530 billion over ten years.
Lastly, Robert Samuelson in the Washington Post reports on findings of a report by the McKinsey Global Institute that provides valuable insights into why US health care costs so much more than it does elsewhere in the world. Unfortunately, it was short on constructive “shovel ready” policies.
So how does one react to such disparate perspectives. Clearly, each study support a specific ideological slant and approach to fixing our admittedly broken system.