EDITORIAL: Health care reform plan will require compromise

Most of us buy health insurance through our employers. The premiums have skyrocketed in the last 10 years, but it’s cheaper to buy coverage as a group than as an individual.

The rising costs and the increasing number of uninsured forced Congress to consider controversial and difficult health care reform ideas.

How do Americans keep health insurance coverage without breaking their budget?

And how can we share the costs of the uninsured without having to pay higher taxes and premiums?

It might be impossible to avoid if Democrats have their way. Last week, they proposed a plan to reform the industry through shared responsibility.

Under the proposal, which the Congressional Budget Office said would cost $1.055 trillion throughout 10 years, individuals would have to buy coverage for themselves and their families, or employers would have to subsidize it for them. Those who cannot afford insurance would be picked up by taxpayers.

The 1,990-page version unveiled by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., would provide coverage to 96 percent of Americans and establish a government-run insurance option with doctors, hospitals and other providers allowed to negotiate rates with the Health and Human Services Department.

President Barack Obama and Democrats see health-care revisions as the most sweeping changes in social services since Social Security in the 1930s and Medicaid in the 1960s. A landmark bill of some kind likely will land on Obama’s desk before the end of 2009, but at this point, it’s uncertain exactly what it will say.

“We come before you to follow in the footsteps of those who gave our country Social Security and then Medicare,” Pelosi told reporters.

In the Senate, Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., lacks the votes to start debate and pass a bill with a public option. He needs to find a compromise to bring legislation to the floor instead of waiting until 2010, when election-year politicking will prevent meaningful reform.

The key to Reid’s success might be Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, who was backing health reform until Reid endorsed a public option with an option for states to back out. A public option refers to a government-funded plan that competes with private insurance.

Snowe has suggested the idea of a trigger, meaning if the cost of coverage were too high during a period of time, a public option would kick in automatically — just not right now.

We like the compromise of allowing states to choose or reject public option. In the end, states, as much as the federal government, would be responsible for implementing change. States would have to design a Medicaid expansion and develop high-risk insurance pools to deal with the deluge.

A Congressional Budget Office analysis says 20 percent, or 6 million of the 30 million, who are expected to buy insurance under the new legislation would enroll in a public option.

In South Carolina, it’s logical to think Gov. Mark Sanford would be reluctant to endorse a public option. Sanford didn’t want to take federal stimulus money to offset cuts to education, let alone take federal money for health care.

The issue could resonate in the 2010 campaign. If GOP lawmakers in the state reject a program open to millions of other Americans, it could result in a backlash.

And one other troubling aspect of the the health-care debate remains. Lawmakers need to make sure zero taxpayer money goes to plans that fund abortion.

The health-care debate has been exhausting and frustrating. The legislation puts the government in control of your health-care plan, mandating coverage.

Universal care, if implemented, would greatly expand government’s role in your life. Medicine will be ruled by politics as much as doctors and insurance companies.

— Unsigned editorials represent the views of this newspaper. Editorial Board members are Mark Laskowski (regional publisher), James Bennett (regional editor), Sam Bundy (sports editor), Kimberly Ginfrida (news editor), David Johnson (regional circulation director), Charles Tomlinson (Lake City News & Post editor) and Jackie Torok (metro editor).