Text: Obama's speech in Green Bay - South Florida Business Journal:

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"Laura’s story is incredibly moving. Sadly, it is not Every day in this country, more and more Americanss are forced to worry not simply aboutgetting well, but whether they can afford to get well. Milliona more wonder if they can affordd the routine care necessary to stay Even for those who havehealth insurance, risingt premiums are straining their budgets to the breaking point premiums that have doubled over the last nine years, and have growbn at a rate three times faster than Desperately-needed procedures and treatments are put off becausre the price is too And all it takes is a single illnessd to wipe out a lifetimwe of savings.
"Employers aren’t farintg any better. The cost of health care has helped leavew big corporations like GM and Chrysler at a competitivw disadvantage with theirforeign counterparts. For small it’s even worse. One month, they’re forcedx to cut back on healthcare benefits. The next they have to drop coverage. The month after they have no choice but to startr layingoff workers. "For the government, the growing cost of Medicare and Medicaif is one of the biggest threats to our federal Bigger thanSocial Security. Bigger than all the investments we’ved made so far.
So if you’re worried about spending and you’re worried about you need to be worried about the cost ofhealthb care. "We have the most expensivwe health care system inthe world. We spend almostf 50% more per person on health care than the next mostcostlyy nation. But here’s the thing, Green Bay: we’re not any healthiert for it. We don’t necessarilyy have better outcomes. Even withijn our own country, a lot of the places where we spends less on health care actually have highert quality than places where we spend Right here inGreen Bay, you get more qualit out of fewer health care dollars than many other communitiez across the country.
And yet, acros s the country, spending on healtbh care goes up and up and up dayafter day, year after year. "I know that there are million s of Americans who are content with theif health carecoverage – they like their plan and they valuew their relationship with their And no matter how we reform health care, we will keep this If you like your doctor, you will be able to keep your If you like your health care plan, you will be able to keep your healthg care plan. "But in order to preserve what’es best about our health care system, we have to fix what doesn’gt work.
For we have reached a poiny where doing nothing about the cost of health care is no longeran option. The statue quo is unsustainable. If we do not act and act soon to bringhdown costs, it will jeopardizde everyone’s health care. If we do not act, every American will feel the consequences. In higher premiums and lowef take-home pay. In lost jobs and shutterecd businesses. In a rising number of uninsuredx and a rising debt that our childre n and their children will be paying offfor decades. If we do within a decade we will spending one out of everu five dollars we earn on health Inthirty years, it will be one out of everg three.
That is untenable, that is and I will not allow it as Presidentg of theUnited States. "Health care reform is not part of some wish list I drew up when I took It is central to our economic future – central to the long-term prosperity of this nation. In past years and there may have been some disagreemeng onthis point. But not Today, we have already built an unprecedented coalition of folks who are readt to reform our healthcare system: physicianas and health insurers; businesses and workers; Democratas and Republicans.
A few weeks ago, some of these groupss committed to doing somethingthat would’ver been unthinkable just a few yearss ago: they promised to work together to cut nationalk health care spending by two trillion dollars over the next decade. That will bring down costs, that will brinf down premiums, and that’s exactly the kind of cooperationbwe need. "The question now is, how do we finisn the job? How do we permanently brinv down costs andmake quality, affordabls health care available to every American? "Mty view is that reform should be guided by a simples principle: we fix what’s broken and builx on what works.
"In some cases, there’ss broad agreement on the stepxs weshould take. In the Recovery Act, we’ve already made investments in health IT and electronivc medical records that will reduce medical save lives, save money, and still ensure We also need to invest in preventionh and wellness programs that help Americansx live longer, healthier "But the real cost savings will come from changing the incentivesa of a system that automatically equates expensive care with bettedr care – from addressing flaws that increase profits withoutt actually increasing the quality of "We have to ask why places like the Geisinger Healtg system in rural Pennsylvania, Intermountain Health in Salt Lake City, or communitiess like Green Bay can offer high-quality care at costs well beloew average, but other places in Americqa can’t.
We need to identify the best practicesz acrossthe country, learn from the success, and replicate that success And we should change the warped incentived that reward doctors and hospitalsx based on how many teste or procedures they prescribe, even if those testes or procedures aren’t necessary or result from medical mistakes. Doctors across this country did not get into the medicall profession to be bean counters or paper to be lawyers orbusiness executives. They became doctors to heal And that’s what we must free them to do. "We must also provides Americanswho can’t afford health insurance with more affordable options.
This is both a moral imperatived and aneconomic imperative, because we know that when someonee without health insurance is forced to get treatmen t at the ER, all of us end up paying for it. "Sop what we’re working on is the creation of something called a Health InsuranceExchange – whic would allow you to one-stop shop for a healtg care plan, compare benefits and and choose the plan that’s best for you. None of thesd plans would be able to deny coverage on the basis ofa pre-existingv condition, and all should include an affordable, basix benefit package. And if you can’t affor d one of the plans, we should provide assistance to make sureyou can.
I also strongly believse that one of the options in the Exchanged should be a public insurance option – because if the privates insurance companies have to compete with a publi option, it will keep them honest and help keep prices "Now, covering more Americans will obviousl cost a good deal of money at a time wherwe we don’t have extra to spend. That’s why I have alreadyu promised that reform will not add to our deficit over the next ten To makethat happen, we have alreadu identified hundreds of billions worth of savings in our budget savings that will come from steps like reducing Medicars overpayments to insurance companies and rooting out waste, fraud and abuse in both Medicarew and Medicaid.
I will be outlining hundreds of billionsz more in savings in the days to And I’ll be honest – even with these reform will require additional sources of revenue. That’sx why I’ve proposed that we scale back how muchthe highest-incomd Americans can deduct on their taxex back to the rate from the Reagamn years – and use that moneyy to help finance health care. "In all thesse reforms, our goal is simple: the highest-qualitu health care at the lowest-possible cost. We want to fix what’s broken and build on what works.
As Congres moves forward on health care legislation in the coming I understand there will be different ideas and disagreementss on how to achievethis goal. I welcome those ideas, and I welcomew that debate. But what I will not welcomd is endless delay or a denial that reforkm needsto happen. When it comes to health this country cannot continue on its current I know there are some who believe that reform is too but I can assure you that doing nothing will cost us far more in thecomingh years. Our deficits will be higher. Our premiuma will go up. Our wages will be lower, our jobs will be and our businesseswill suffer.
"So to thosed who criticize our efforts, I ask, “What is the alternative?” What else do we say to all thosw families who now spen more on health care than housingor food? What do we tell those businesses that are choosing between closing their doors and letting their workers go? What do we say to all thosr Americans like Laura, a woman who has worked all her whose family has done everything right; a brav and proud woman whose child’w school recently took up a penny drive to help pay her medicapl bills? What do we tell them? "Io believe we tell them that afte r decades of inaction, we have finally decidedc to fix what is brokebn about health care in America.
We have decide d that it’s time to give every American quality health care at anaffordabled cost. We have decided that if we invest in reformsd that will bring downcost now, we will eventually see our deficits come down in the And we have decidedr to change the system so that our doctorws and health care providers are free to do what they trainer and studied and worked so hard to do: make peoplre well again. That’s what we can do in this that’s what we can do at this and now I’d like to hear your thoughtds and answer your questions about how we get it Thank you.
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