Advisers to Presidential candidates discuss health care proposals during online debate

Advisers to the two major presidential candidates during an online debate on the Wall Street Journal Web site discussed the effect that their health care proposals would have on the employer-sponsored health insurance market, the Journal's "Health Blog" reports.

As part of his plan, presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.) has proposed to have private health plans and a new public plan compete in the health insurance market, with subsidies to help low-income residents purchase coverage. Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) as part of his plan has proposed to replace a tax break for employees who receive health insurance from employers with a refundable tax credit for families to purchase private coverage.

David Cutler, health care policy adviser to Obama, said that the Obama proposal would "shore up the employment-based system, not tear it down: lower premiums that firms face through investments in information technology and prevention; create a setting where individuals and small firms can buy insurance the way that large firms do; make sure that insurers cannot exclude firms because one employee is sick."

Jay Khosla, health care policy adviser to McCain, said that the McCain proposal "simply aims to bring equity and choice to our health care system, including allowing American families to keep their current coverage." He added, "The McCain plan gives American families a $5,000 refundable tax credit ($2,500 for individuals) to give them more choices to purchase portable coverage that would stay with them from 'job to job' or 'job to home.' His plan directly and comprehensively addresses the single biggest threat" to employer-sponsored health insurance -- "rising costs" (Rubenstein, "Health Blog," Wall Street Journal, 8/11).

NPR's "Morning Edition" on Wednesday profiled the Obama and McCain health care proposals (Rovner, "Morning Edition," NPR, 8/13).

Opinion Pieces

Three newspapers recently published opinion pieces that addressed health care issues in the presidential election. Summaries appear below.

• Marie Cocco, Denver Post: The "crisis in health insurance" has "deepened in recent years as the number of uninsured has climbed and out-of-pocket costs for those still with insurance have soared," syndicated columnist Cocco writes in a Post opinion piece. While the Democratic Party Platform Committee included "the commitment that every American man, woman and child be guaranteed to have affordable, comprehensive health care," in its platform, Cocco questions whether Obama shares the same goal. Cocco writes that Obama "did not campaign during the primaries on a plan" she believes "would achieve universal coverage and ... excoriated [Sen. Hillary Rodham] Clinton (D-N.Y.) for her proposal to mandate" that all U.S. residents have coverage (Cocco, Denver Post, 8/12).
• Martin Schram, Seattle Post-Intelligencer: Obama and McCain agree on the "unconscionable failure of our government to honor its commitments to our military veterans" and have "promised separately a number of strikingly similar solutions," Schram, who writes political analysis for Scripps Howard, writes in a Post-Intelligencer opinion piece. According to Schram, both candidates have "called for a sweeping overhaul of the Department of Veterans Affairs benefits claims program," with proposals to increase staff to "end the unconscionable backlogs" and "unfair claim denials." In addition, McCain "proposes one solution item that Obama has not yet mentioned," a plan to "provide each veteran with a Veterans Care Access Card" that a "veteran with an injury or illness incurred during military service could use to get free treatment at a local hospital if the VA hospital is too far away," Schram writes. "There is one idea I have urged that McCain nor Obama have not," he writes, adding, "Let's rename the VA ... the Department of Veterans' Advocacy and let the new VA take the lead in providing each veteran with the benefits and care they have earned" (Schram, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 8/12).
• Mike Ervin, Spokane Spokesman-Review: Obama and McCain "need to start addressing the issue of long-term care," which is "of vital importance for people with disabilities and our families and friends," Ervin, a disability rights activist with ADAPT, writes in a Spokesman-Review opinion piece. According to Ervin, because "federal long-term care policy still heavily favors institutionalization, countless people with disabilities are forced to give up their freedom in exchange for assistance," and "reversing the institutional bias in Medicaid is key" to efforts to address the issue. However, neither "Obama nor McCain lists long-term care as an issue on their main Web pages," although "Obama does have a nine-page platform addressing disability issues" that includes "support of a major piece of proposed legislation that would make it much easier for people to receive Medicaid-funded assistance in their homes," Ervin writes (Ervin, Spokane Spokesman-Review, 8/13).