The G.O.P. Bill Forces States to Build Health Systems From Scratch. That's Hard.

[Eugene]

Source: New York Times

The G.O.P. Bill Forces States to Build Health Systems From Scratch. That’s Hard.

Margot Sanger-Katz SEPT. 21, 2017

In 2003, health care policy makers in Massachusetts agreed that the state should build a system to expand coverage to its uninsured residents.

It took four years before Romneycare was fully up and running.

In between, politicians had to think hard about how they wanted the system to work: how money would be raised and spent, what benefits would be offered, whether and how markets should be used to distribute coverage, whether people who didn’t buy coverage should be penalized. They had to build a computer system to help people check their eligibility and understand their options. They had to recruit insurers to participate. And they needed to find uninsured residents and persuade them to enroll.

A new health care bill before the Senate would require every state in the country to make a similar soup-to-nuts evaluation of how they’d like their health care systems to work, to build such a system and be ready to open their doors in substantially less time — just over two years. That may not be realistic.

“The answer is absolutely no,” said Jon Kingsdale, who ran Massachusetts Connector, the system that matched Massachusetts residents with health insurance, and is now a public health professor and a consultant. “That’s not enough time for most states to figure it out.”

-snip-

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/21/upshot/the-gop-bill-forces-states-to-build-health-systems-from-scratch-thats-hard.html

[Turbineguy]

1. And expensive.

"Keep the gubmint outta my Medicare!"

[procon]

2. All those red states that refused Medicaid expansion and the

36 states did not set up their own marketplaces have no fallback plans to implement any sort of state run health system. That means they'll look to privatise healthcare and let the insurance industry set up any program they can get away with that rakes in higher profits while undercutting spending on patient care.