EDITORIAL HEALTH CARE DILEMMA GOVERNOR'S PLAN IS A STARTING POINT FOR A HEALTHY PUBLIC DEBATE.THE good news in Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's proposal for a bold plan to provide health insurance for all Californians is that it jump-starts a discussion long overdue OVERDUE. A bill, note, bond or other contract, for the payment of money at a particular day, when not paid upon the day, is overdue. 2. The indorsement of a note or bill overdue, is equivalent to drawing a new bill payable at sight. 2 Conn. 419; 18 Pick. . By making health insurance a central issue of his second term and the upcoming legislative year, Schwarzenegger puts the shameful shame·ful adj. 1. a. Causing shame; disgraceful. b. Giving offense; indecent. 2. Archaic Full of shame; ashamed. state of this broken system at the top of the Legislature's to-fix list. And it's about time It's About Time may refer to:
adj. Too expensive: medical care that has become unaffordable for many. un prices. The bad news is that Schwarzenegger and the Legislature face a dilemma that has no easy answers, and probably can't be solved all at once. Already, this grand plan for mandatory health insurance, as outlined Monday, has critics decrying the fee of up to 4 percent on businesses, doctors and hospitals as a disguised tax that will cause more harm than good. There are other problems as well, not the least of which is that health care is ultimately a national issue, not one easily solved by a single state. And there's no guarantee that the proposal would ever reach the ideal of providing insurance to every person, especially when so many of its beneficiaries are undocumented immigrants leading invisible lives outside the system. Surely, Schwarzenegger knows this and that there are already several competing plans in the hopper A tray, or chute, that accepts input to a mechanical device, such as a disk duplicator or printer. In the days of punch cards, millions of cards were numerically or alphabetically organized by placing them into the hopper of a card sorter, taking them out of all the stackers and putting , include one for a single-payer system single-payer system Health reform Social medicine, in which all medical services are paid by a single reimbursement agency. See Canadian plan, Clinton Plan, Managed care, Socialized medicine. . But he also knows that by putting forward a sweeping reform proposal, he has focused the public conversation on health care on finding solutions to the many specific problems. These include the huge percentage of revenue -- up to 30 percent -- that insurers spend on overhead; the exclusion of people in dangerous occupations or with pre-existing conditions; and the overuse overuse Health care The common use of a particular intervention even when the benefits of the intervention don't justify the potential harm or cost–eg, prescribing antibiotics for a probable viral URI. Cf Misuse, Underuse. of emergency rooms by the uninsured. There are many other issues as well and it seems unlikely that all the competing interests can come together around a single plan that balances out the pain and actually fixes what's broken. But by focusing the debate on finding answers to the problem, the governor has set the stage for Democrats and Republicans, business and labor, insurers and health providers to agree on a pragmatic and achievable plan. It may be impossible to fix the state's failing health care system all at once. But by fixing specific problems, it will set the stage for further improvements later. The governor and the Legislature found common ground last year and have promised to work together again. Health care ought to be at the top of their list of problems to start fixing. |
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