Some tricky surgery
Text 
Saturday, February 2, 2008 | 
No Comments [ Add Comment ]
No Comments [ Add Comment ]
Home » News 
» Story View
ref= http://www.standard.net/live/multimedia/aarchive?aud=snet_b008fe0348eaa2298d65f34d8127c4fa = _blank>Listen to audio of the editorial board meeting on health reform
» Story View
ref= http://www.standard.net/live/multimedia/aarchive?aud=snet_b008fe0348eaa2298d65f34d8127c4fa = _blank>Listen to audio of the editorial board meeting on health reform
Members of the Standard-Examiner's editorial board met with the House of Representatives' majority leadership team Tuesday, and one of the primary topics of discussion was health system reform. The issue is dizzyingly complex, and it was clear lawmakers are still trying to get their heads around the subject.
In all honesty, the deck's stacked against them ever achieving real success. As they admitted, the past four or five governors have tried to launch efforts aimed at reforming the way health care is dispensed, the availability and affordability of health insurance, cost-containment and the rest, but they've done little, if anything, to effect substantive change. (Listen to portions of their comments during our meeting on the Web under the "Opinion" tab at www.standard.net.)
While we join with lawmakers, the governor and all Utahns in hoping for significant reforms that would improve service, contain and/or lower costs and make insurance available to the estimated 300,000-plus residents of the state who don't have it, we're concerned that the process will make success more difficult to achieve.
The plan, as outlined by House Majority Leader David Clark, calls for three years of study by a task force, and implementation of reforms piece by piece over the next decade.
Even in the meeting with the Standard's editorial board, Clark acknowledged that task forces can be "black holes" into which good intentions disappear, never to re-emerge.
So, we have to ask: Why such a long, laborious process?
When Gov. Jon Huntsman originally made health system reform one of his chief priorities for this legislative session, he approached the issue like an executive: He planned to have his Office of Economic Development study the particulars and make recommendations to the Legislature by next year. But lawmakers balked. Legislative leaders decided they'd prefer to run the reform process, and the governor's people will be among several participants invited to the table.
Three years of study and a decade of implementation seems too long to us. It's pretty well understood by the experts in the field where the problems are -- the inefficiencies, the excesses and unfairness in the system. The danger now, of course, is that this thing will be massaged to death by lobbyists for the health industry -- hospitals, physicians and other health care professionals -- and insurance companies. The health industry, remember, spends a lot of money doling out campaign contributions and paying those lobbyists to argue their case.
By the time lawmakers get through trying to satisfy various segments of the health system industry to which they may be beholden, the likelihood that real reform will happen seems iffy. Then again, maybe we're too cynical -- we'd love to be wrong.
There are no comments for this page.
Add Your Comment
| Name: | |
| Comment: | |
| Security Code: |
Type the characters to the left in the box exactly as they appear. |
| Your IP: | 38.103.63.55 This address is recorded for security purposes. |
