Caucuses take lead on health care reform

It’s time to move forward on the health care crisis and cover everyone. That’s the message Spokane residents delivered clearly, and with enthusiasm, on July 29 at a well-attended health care caucus, adding to statewide momentum on addressing the crisis.

Community members spoke up about their priorities in health-care reform at the caucus, one of seven sponsored by Healthy Washington Coalition across the state to discuss what the primary values for health care should be as the Washington state Legislature begins a new effort to address the health care crisis in 2009.

More than 200 members of our community from all walks of life attended, including senior citizens, business people, union members, doctors, nurses, health care administrators and community activists, and most agreed that covering everyone is a key value to uphold in solving the health care crisis.

And we do have a crisis.

In Spokane County, more than 49,000 citizens lack health care coverage, and many of those with coverage are seriously underinsured. More than 19,000 Washingtonians per year file for bankruptcy as a result of medical debt, making it the leading cause of bankruptcy in this state. Of those who filed for bankruptcy, an astounding three-quarters of them had health insurance coverage.

Many would prefer to wait on solving the health care crisis, to defer to a national solution or wait and see what happened in other states. Others, often those of us with good coverage, just want to wait.

But now is not the time to wait. As household costs such as gasoline, food and other necessities continue to climb, even more working families are poised to drop into the ranks of the uninsured and underinsured. Local businesses – particularly small ones – have been facing a decade of double-digit increases in health benefit costs. As those costs keep rising, owners won’t be able to maintain health benefits if they want to stay in business.

Washington state is beginning to move on the crisis, approving Senate Bill 6333 in 2008 to have an independent firm do a cost-benefit analysis of five state health care proposals. The goal is to improve access to quality health care for all Washingtonians, to help reduce the growing cost of health care and to assure that Washingtonians get the quality health care they need and deserve. The results will be reviewed in the in the 2009 legislative session, and a citizens working group will be appointed with the mandate to share and discuss the information learned from the actuarial study with all Washingtonians.

Prioritizing a set of guiding values to evaluate the possible reform proposals was the goal of the Spokane Health Care Caucus. Each of us was asked to discuss and debate health care values and then to vote on our top four to incorporate as goals into health care reform. In Spokane, the top four proved to be:

•Cover everyone.

•Provide public-health prevention services for all.

•Ensure the cost of health care, including prescriptions, is affordable.

•Eliminate disparities in access to health care and in health outcomes based on factors such as income, ethnicity and job status.

We in Spokane County may have different priorities than the folks in Bellevue, Vancouver or Everett. That’s why these caucuses are happening in seven locations around the state. We need to learn what is important to our fellow Washingtonians, and the caucuses create the opportunity for this broad public dialogue.

This much we know for sure: People who live in Washington and businesses that operate here can’t afford to wait any longer to address this growing crisis. We need to do the kind of health care reform that will make Washington state a leader in addressing health care access, cost and quality. Doing less is not an option.