For Immediate Release
Office of the
Press Secretary
January 31, 2006
State of the Union: Affordable and Accessible Health Care
In His State Of The Union Address, President Bush Proposed A
Comprehensive Agenda To Make Health Care In America More Affordable,
Portable, Transparent, And Efficient. Americans enjoy the best
health care facilities and medical professionals in the world, but
our citizens are concerned about the cost of health care, losing
their health insurance if they change jobs, and a lack of
information about price and quality. The President believes that
Americans deserve high-quality, reasonably priced, reliable health
care, and the security of knowing they will have it when they need
it.
The President's Reform Agenda Can Make The Health Care System
More Efficient While Continuing To Lead The World In Cutting Edge
Medicine. Americans should be able to choose their health care based
on individual needs and preferences and easily obtain understandable
information about the price and quality of the care they receive.
Insurance should be portable and affordable. The President proposes
to improve health care through initiatives to provide increased
stability and peace of mind for working families across the country.
The President's health care agenda includes:
- Expanding Health Savings Accounts (HSAs)
- Making Health Insurance More Portable
- Improving Information On Price And Quality To Make Health Care
More Transparent
- Leveling The Playing Field For Individuals And Small Business
Employees
- Passing Medical Liability Reform
- Improving Access To Health Information Technology
- Assisting Vulnerable Americans
Expanding Health Savings Accounts
HSAs Are Making Health Care More Affordable And Accessible.
Established by the Medicare bill signed into law by President Bush
in December 2003, HSAs allow Americans to save tax-free dollars in
accounts to pay for their health care expenses. These accounts are
accompanied by high-deductible comprehensive insurance policies that
cover preventive care and larger medical bills. Since January 2004,
more than 3 million Americans have enrolled in HSAs, which are
helping make health insurance more affordable for individuals and
companies while providing greater choices and flexibility in how
workers and employers spend their health care dollars.
The President proposed to build on this success and expand HSAs
by:
- Giving Individuals That Purchase HSAs On Their Own The Same
Tax Advantages As Those With Employer-Sponsored Insurance. The
President proposes making premiums for HSA-compatible insurance
policies deductible from income taxes when purchased by
individuals outside of work. In addition, an income tax credit
would offset payroll taxes paid on premiums paid for their HSA
policies. This will level the playing field for those who
currently do not have access to employer health care plans,
including the self-employed, unemployed, and workers for companies
that donft offer health insurance. For Americans who are not
working, especially early retirees, premiums for the purchase of
non-group HSA plans would now be allowed tax-free from an HSA
account.
- Eliminating All Taxes On Out-Of-Pocket Spending Through HSAs.
The President proposed allowing Americans with HSAs and their
employers to make annual contributions to their accounts to cover
all out-of-pocket costs under their HSA policy, not just their
deductible as provided under current law. This will allow patients
to cover all their out-of-pocket expenses tax-free through their
HSA. The new proposal would also provide a credit for payroll
taxes paid on HSA contributions made by individuals. The
President's HSA proposals are projected to increase the number of
Americans with HSAs from the current 14 million to 21 million by
2010, a 50-percent rise.
Making Health Insurance More Portable
- Americans Should Be Able To Take Their Health Insurance With
Them When They Change Jobs, Move, Become Self-Employed, Or Leave
The Labor Force. Americans should not have to worry about changing
doctors, learning a new insurance company bureaucracy, having
their premiums go up if a family member is sick, losing their
insurance tax advantage when leaving employment-based plans, or
being subject to more costly mandates. The lack of portability can
lead to "job lock" in which workers are hesitant to leave their
job if anyone in the family is in less-than-perfect health.
- Enabling Portable HSA Insurance Policies. Employers would have
the ability to offer workers a Portable HSA insurance policy that
the employees would own, control, and be able to take wherever
they went. Their premiums would be tax-free and would not increase
based on their health status at the time that they changed jobs,
left the labor force, or moved. Employers could contribute to new
employees' Portable HSA insurance policies – no matter where the
policy was originally purchased. Employers would have the ability
to decide whether or how much to contribute to these plans, but
whatever they contributed would be tax-free.
The President Supports Permitting The Purchase Of Health
Insurance Across State Lines. This would allow Americans to buy the
best health insurance, based on their own circumstances, instead of
being limited to only the policies available in their state.
Allowing Americans to purchase health insurance policies issued in
other states will provide much-needed choice and competition, while
retaining the consumer protections of enforcement and licensing
states currently provide.
Improving Information On Price And Quality To Make Health Care
More Transparent
Americans Should Be Able To Easily Obtain Understandable
Information About The Price And Quality Of Health Care. The
President urges medical providers and insurance companies to make
information about prices and quality readily available to all
Americans prior to the time of service or treatment.
Leveling The Playing Field For Individuals And Small Business
Employees
The Administration Will Work To Make It Easier For Small
Businesses To Provide Health Care For Their Employees. Small
businesses are at a real disadvantage in providing health benefits
for workers. Because they buy coverage for only a handful of workers
at a time, small businesses pay much higher costs than large
employers or labor unions for similar health benefits. In part
because costs go up over time and one sick worker can cause a large
premium increase, small employers are less than half as likely to
offer health benefits to their workers as large employers.
- The President Calls On Congress To Allow Small Businesses To
Form Association Health Plans (AHPs). AHPs let small businesses
join together to purchase health coverage, giving them the same
advantages, administrative efficiencies, and negotiating clout
enjoyed by big businesses and labor unions. By purchasing coverage
for thousands of employees at a time, association members can pay
lower premiums for better coverage.
Passing Medical Liability Reform
The President Calls On Congress To Make The Medical Liability
System Fairer And More Predictable While Reducing Wasteful Costs.
Frivolous lawsuits and excessive jury awards limit access to health
care by driving health care providers out of many communities and
increase costs by forcing doctors to practice defensive medicine.
Because lawsuits are driving many good doctors out of practice,
women in nearly 1,500 American counties are left without a single
OB-GYN. Medical liability reforms would secure an injured patient's
ability to get quicker compensation for economic losses, while
reducing frivolous lawsuits against doctors that raise the cost of
health care for all. The President has proposed proven, common-sense
reforms that reserve punitive damages for egregious cases where they
are justified, limit non-economic damages to reasonable amounts,
ensure that old cases cannot be brought to court years after an
event, and provide that defendants pay judgments in proportion to
their fault.
Improving Health Information Technology (IT)
The Administration Is Working To Expand The Use Of Health IT To
Lower Costs, Reduce Medical Errors, And Improve Quality Of Care. In
2004, the President launched an initiative to make electronic health
records available to most Americans within the next 10 years. We
have already seen the Veterans Health Administration and
private-sector health systems use information technology to increase
quality, encourage savings, and reduce errors. With electronic
health records, information needed to treat patients effectively
will be a computer click away, no matter where the patient is
receiving care. The Administration has taken steps towards improving
health IT, including: establishing the position of the National
Coordinator for Health Information Technology and providing $100
million to fund projects harmonizing standards for electronic
information exchange; developing certification criteria to ensure
health IT investments meet proper standards; addressing privacy and
security issues; and developing models for a national Internet-based
health information system. Through the American Health Information
Community (AHIC), the Administration and the private sector are
building a common framework for implementing a nationwide electronic
health records system.
- In 2006, The Administration Will Work To Develop Nationwide
Health IT Standards To Accelerate Patient Access To Electronic
Health Records. This includes a "medical clipboard" that can only
be accessed with the patient's consent, electronic medication
history and lab results, and ways to utilize health information
tools to monitor potential disease outbreaks such as pandemic
influenza.
Assistance For Vulnerable Americans
The President Proposes Extending The Benefits Of HSAs To
Low-Income Families And Individuals Through Refundable Tax Credits.
A family of four making $25,000 or less will be able to get a
refundable tax credit of $3,000 from the Federal government to help
buy an HSA-compatible policy that covers them for major medical
expenses. These families will have the flexibility to put up to
$1,000 of the money directly into an HSA to pay for routine medical
expenses. What the family does not spend can be saved in the account
and carried over to the next year, earning interest tax-free.
The President Proposes Providing $500 Million Per Year To
Encourage States To Test Innovative Methods For Covering Chronically
Ill Residents. Americans who are chronically ill and are not part of
an employer or public pool must pay the full burden of their care
through high premiums or, in some cases, go without insurance at
all. Some states have established high-risk pools to insure
chronically ill patients otherwise denied coverage, but there are
also other innovative approaches that could provide better coverage
at lower costs. The President proposes grants, awarded by the HHS
Secretary, that would help cover chronically ill patients by helping
up to 10 states build on their existing high-risk pools or test
other innovative approaches such as risk-adjusted subsidies or plans
designed to manage chronic illnesses such as diabetes.
The President Supports Allowing Employers To Make Higher
Contributions To The HSAs Of Chronically Ill Employees. Under
current law, employers must contribute the same amount to each
employee's HSA. This prevents employers from providing extra help to
their chronically ill employees – employees who are more likely to
use their HSAs to pay for their higher-than-average out-of-pocket
expenses. Permitting employers to make higher contributions to HSAs
of chronically ill employees will help those workers fund their HSAs
and pay their out-of-pocket expenses tax-free through their
accounts.
The President Proposes Expanding AHPs To Allow Civic, Community,
And Religious Groups To Purchase Health Coverage For Their Members.
This gives individuals and their families, including the most
vulnerable Americans, the ability to pool together to buy health
insurance outside of their workplace. Giving people more choices to
buy insurance at group rates from organizations they already know
and trust will help many Americans purchase quality, affordable, and
portable health insurance.
The President Supports Increased Funding For Community Health
Centers. It is vital to get care to poor communities, where access
is often hardest to come by, and basic primary and preventative
services could do an enormous amount to raise living standards and
well being. The President has worked to expand the number and reach
of Community Health Centers. In 2001, there were 3,317 sites serving
some 10.3 million patients. The Administration has funded more than
800 new or expanded centers and will fund approximately 400 more in
the next two years. This has allowed Community Health Centers to
build the capacity to serve more than 3.5 million additional
Americans, with nearly 2 million more to be served in the next two
years.
- The President Has Proposed Establishing Community Health
Centers In Poor Communities. To make health care available where
it is needed most, the Administration has set out to establish a
Community Health Center or rural clinic in every high-poverty
county in America that can support one. The President's FY 2007
budget proposes to establish 80 such centers or clinics in poor
counties not currently served.
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