John Edwards on Health Care 2004 Democratic Nominee for Vice President; Former Jr Senator (NC)

Sub-sections under Health Care:
• Universal Coverage
• Voting Record
• Other issues under Health Care

No one is not worthy of health care

Critics call plan backdoor to a single payer system

His healthcare plan seems as a backdoor to a single payer system, [according to critics]. “Edwards will give you free healthcare,” warned the National Review. This is a bad thing, of course, because “everyone, in a society of allegedly free healthcare, would actually be paying the collective costs of healthcare. They used to call that socialized medicine.”

Don’t spend another decade arguing; get it done

My proposal, a bold plan, doesn’t go directly to single-payer--I think it can be accomplished politically. Now, it may be that that gravitates towards a single-payer plan.

I think we can get support from across the political spectrum and will accomplish a lot of what we want to do. Second, it does give people a choice. And I think Americans have become accustomed to having choice, and I think they want to be able to choose what their healthcare plan is.

Provide incentives for students to go to nursing school

Exactly the same healthcare rights for same-sex couples

A: Those rights should be available to gay and lesbian couples. In my universal health care plan, and I’ve made it very clear that those rights to gay and lesbian couples would be exactly the same as they would for straight couples. And so those health care benefits would be available to someone in that situation.

Fully fund finding a cure for AIDS

1. We need to fully fund finding a cure for AIDS, so we can end this scourge once and for all.
2. We need to fully fund the law known as Ryan White, to make sure that the treatment is available for anybody who’s diagnosed with AIDS.
3. Finally, we need to ensure that Medicaid covers AIDS drugs and AIDS treatment to make sure that people get the treatment they need, particularly low-income individuals who are diagnosed with AIDS.

Mental health parity: treat it just like physical health

I’m confident, during the course of this campaign, that some candidate will say, listen, we’re going to have universal health care, and in the process, we’re also going to eliminate the federal deficit. Is it finally time for us to have a president of the United States that will be honest with the American people?

It costs money to have universal health care. I will be the first to say it. My plan costs $90 to $120 billion a year. It’s not cheap, but I pay for it by getting rid of Bush’s tax cuts for people who make over $200,000 dollars a year.

End Bush’s tax cuts to pay for health care

Medicare: invest in preventive care & better chronic care

A: Yes. Well, we have a huge challenge on this front. I think the starting place is Medicare, not Social Security, simply because Social Security is significantly longer-term than Medicare. Medicare has very serious short-term, intense financial problems, and there are things we can do that we’re not doing. We ought to have much better chronic care management than we have today. We ought to be investing in a serious and systemic way in preventative care, which we’re not doing today. And we have significant fraud & abuse in the Medicare system. I think there are things we can do to strengthen Medicare. We ought to require providers to compete against each other, & using the power of the federal government to negotiate better prices in Medicare.

America’s seniors & children victimized by healthcare cuts

Double the funding to fight the global AIDS epidemic

Support allowing prescription drugs into the US from Canada

EDWARDS: They had a choice on allowing prescription drugs into this country from Canada, of being with the American people or with the drug companies. They were with the drug companies. They had a choice on negotiating discounts in the Medicare prescription drug bill of being with the American people or with the drug companies. They were with the drug companies. They had a choice on the patients’ bill of rights, allowing people to make their own health care decisions and not having insurance companies make them, be with the American people, be with the big insurance companies. They’re with the insurance companies.

Health care should be viewed in larger context of poverty

KERRY: No. My program is more ambitious, because what I would roll back Bush’s tax cut for the wealthiest Americans, and create a federal fund that takes all the catastrophic cases in America out of the private system, which means, effectively, every individual in every business in America will be capped at $50,000 of risk. That will provide each American who has health care today with a $1,000 minimum reduction in their premium.

Q: Sen. Edwards, that is one of the major differences between your plan. Is that idea affordable?

EDWARDS: The issue becomes whether you believe health care is an isolated problem. For those in poverty and the struggling middle class, if one thing goes wrong-if they have a health care problem-they go right off the cliff. I mandate health care for all kids and cover the most vulnerable adults. But we also have to find ways to not only lift these families out of poverty.

Cap on damages for personal injuries is discriminatory

A: Bush is proposing about this and what happens in our courtrooms shows his philosophy about everything. He doesn’t believe in democracy. He hates the idea that his friends and his supporters are going to walk into a courtroom and be treated exactly the same way as a child or a family who have been the victims of fraud or abuse. The victim have been disabled for life, I mean, this could not be more discriminatory than it is.

Med-mal cases are about accountability for mistakes

But physicians err like the rest of us, and when, through neglect or reckless behavior, they cause damage, they must be held accountable for the consequences of their action or inaction. My challenge would be to shatter the jurors’ prejudice in favor of a good but mistaken doctor and against an alcoholic client and to allow them to see the facts for what they were. [Edwards won the case].

Campbell verdict empowered nurses & informed consent

After the headlines stopped, I could take some satisfaction in the changes I saw happening. But in the end, this was always a case about one family, about a six-year-old girl and her parents, good working people.

Bush works for big HMOs and big pharma; I stand up for you

I have done it. I have fought them all of my life. It is what I have done since I’ve been in the US Senate. I have offered legislation to bring down the cost of prescription drugs for every single American.

The only reason that the efforts we have made in the Congress to bring down the cost of health care in America are not the law of the land, is because the president works for those people, and we have got to put somebody in the White House who will stand up for you, will stand up against them, and will fight that culture in Washington, that prevents taking them on.

Health care crisis requires fighting big corporations

More help to those who fall through the cracks of the system

For universal coverage for kids in ‘04; now coverage for all

A: I was for universal health care for children in 2004. I believe that now we are at a crisis stage. We have a dysfunctional health care system and the only true answer is universal health care for everybody. And I might add, Senator Clinton was not for universal health care at the beginning of this campaign.

Taking away Congress’ healthcare intended to shake things up

A: Well, first of all, when I talk about shaking up Washington and making this place actually work for the American people, it is interesting to watch the people inside Washington, including Senator Clinton, circle the wagons and start protecting Washington politicians. The president has enormous power. He has the bully pulpit to make this proposal to America and to the Congress. If you go across this country and say, “Your Congressman or your Congresswoman is for their own health care and their family’s health care but they’re not for health care for you”--the whole point of this is to shake the place up.

AdWatch: Universal health care by July 2009

EDWARDS: When I’m president, I’m going to say to members of Congress and members of my administration, including my Cabinet, “I’m glad that you have health care coverage and that your family has health care coverage. But if you don’t pass universal health care by July 2009--six months--I’m going to use my power as president to take your health care away from you.” There’s no excuse for politicians in Washington having health care when you don’t have health care.

EDWARDS PRESS RELEASE: Edwards said on the first day of his administration he would submit legislation that ends health care coverage for the president, all members of Congress, and all senior political appointees in both branches of government on July 20th, 2009 - unless universal health care legislation that meets four specific, non-negotiable principles has been passed by that date.

FactCheck: President cannot remove Congress’ health care

All Edwards could do as president is to push Congress to legislate away its own health-care coverage. And in fact, that’s as far as he goes when stating his position on his Web site. In a press release, Edwards says he would “submit legislation that ends health care coverage... on July 20th, 2009--unless universal health care legislation that meets four specific, non-negotiable principles has been passed by that date.”

That doesn’t sound like much of a threat, does it? It may make a tougher-sounding political ad, but it’s a threat that is misleading and empty.

$90B-$120B per year for healthcare, by ending Bush tax cut

A: $90 to $120 billion a year. I know that there will be some who argue that they can do universal health care either for free or for very low cost. I don’t believe that’s the truth. And I think we need to tell people the truth about this. My plan is $90 to $120 billion a year. And I pay for by rolling back President Bush’s tax cuts for people who make over $200,000 a year.

If not universal coverage, which people wouldn’t be covered?

A: Well, basically what I decided was, first, the only way to have universal coverage was to actually mandate it, in other words, to have a legal requirement that every man, woman, and child in America be covered. That was probably the single most controversial element of my proposal when I made it. I believed that that was important because if anybody’s plan is not universal, then they should be made to explain to the American people what man or woman in America is not worthy of health care. I think they’re all worthy of health care. And then I constructed it in a way that everybody required to be covered, that people could choose between a private plan and the government plan, which is essentially Medicare plus.

Let people choose between private plan and single-payer

A: I constructed my healthcare plan in a way that everybody is required to be covered, but that people could choose between a private plan and the government plan, which is essentially Medicare-Plus. I did that for a very simple reason. Because there is a very good and legitimate argument that we should go straight to single-payer health care as other countries have. I’ve also heard the flipside of that from lots of people, who are nervous about going to a Canadian system, for example. We’re going to have the American people deciding what provides the most cost effective, most efficient, best health care.

Q: You would not necessarily eliminate a single-payer system as the best way to go?

A: Oh, no, I would not. I mean, there are huge advantages to single-payer. Much lower administrative costs. But I thought it was something that we should let Americans decide. Get everybody covered, get rid of the holes in the system.

Take on insurance & drug companies, who have blocked reform

Comprehensive coverage costs $90B to $120B a year

A: I do not believe you can have universal health care for free. There are some who I think will make that argument. I don’t think it’s the truth. My own health care plan, which was the first one in this campaign and I’m very proud of it--comprehensive, requires coverage for everybody--costs $90 to $120 billion a year. And I pay for it by getting rid of Bush’s tax cuts for people who make over $200,000 a year.

FactCheck: Plan costs $106B-$146B per year, not $90B-$120B

Actually, the cost of the plan in its first year would be $105.6 billion to $145.6 billion, according to an independent estimate by Emory University professor Ken Thorpe. That assumes the plan could be enacted quickly and take effect in 2010, within a year of the new president being sworn in. The Edwards campaign says the candidate’s $90 billion to $120 billion price tag is what the plan would cost if it were in place today--which isn’t possible. An aide says the campaign worked with Thorpe, and their estimate is based on Thorpe’s estimate of the cost as a percentage of the nation’s gross domestic product. But it is not an estimate of what the plan would cost in the first year it possibly could take effect, and Edwards didn’t make that clear.

2004: universal coverage irresponsible; but US has changed

A: That’s true and so has America. I proposed universal health care for children at that point. What happened in ‘94 is we didn’t get universal health care, but we got NAFTA. And when I’m president, you have my word I will never pull the universal health care bill. I will making sure that’s enacted.

Congress grants healthcare to all, or give up their own

Edwards’ legislative plans would have been more accurately portrayed as asking Congress either to grant health care to all citizens or give it up for themselves.

For universal coverage, must mandate everyone be covered

OBAMA: Absolutely it does. John and I have a disagreement. John thinks that the only way we get universal coverage is to mandate coverage. I think that the problem is not that people are trying to avoid getting health care coverage. It is folks like that who are desperately in desire of it, but they can can’t afford it.

Q: [to Edwards]: Does Sen. Obama provide universal coverage

EDWARDS: No, because the only way to provide universal coverage is to mandate that everyone be covered. Sen. Obama’s made a very serious proposal, and I’m not casting aspersions on his plan. It just doesn’t cover everybody. The only way to cover everybody is to mandate it. We have talked about it too long. We have got to stand up to the insurance companies and the drug companies. It is the only way we’re ever going to bring about real change. We should be outraged by these stories.

FactCheck: Medicaid already covers treatment for HIV/AIDS

Actually, Medicaid, a state-administered health care program for the poor, covers AIDS drugs already. There are no state limitations on Medicaid coverage of AIDS prescriptions.

What Edwards may have been trying to say is that he favors extending Medicaid coverage to low-income HIV patients who don’t qualify for Medicaid because they aren’t yet sick enough to be considered disabled. Even for low-income persons, just being diagnosed with HIV is not sufficient to be eligible for Medicaid. Many low-income people with HIV are not eligible for Medicaid until they become disabled, despite available therapies that might prevent disability.

Obama’s health plan will leave about 15 million uncovered

Require employer coverage for every single American

A: I would get rid of Bush’s tax cuts for people who make over $200,000 a year. My universal health care plan would require employers to cover all their employees or pay into a fund that covers the cracks in the health care system--mental health parity; chronic care; preventative care; long-term care; subsidized health care costs. Give people a choice, including a government choice. And require that every single American be covered.

Dysfunctional health care system needs bold, dramatic change

Basically what we do is cover all Americans. In my plan there’s shared responsibilities. The employers are required to either cover their employees or to pay into a fund that will help pay for coverage for their employees. The government plays an important role. The government will set up health care markets all across America, and in each of those markets if you’re the consumer, you can go in and choose what your health care plan would be. Some of the choices are private insurers, and then one choice is a government plan, basically a Medicare Plus plan. And the idea is to determine whether Americans actually want a private insurer or whether they’d rather have government run Medicare Plus kind of single-payer plan. And we’ll find out over time which way people go.

Universal coverage makes US business more competitve abroad

A: My plan deals directly with the concerns that small business has. We have a competitiveness issue not only between competitors here in America, we have a huge competitiveness issue between our businesses in America and the rest of the world. If we have a truly universal health care plan that covers every single American from the time they’re born until the time they die, it makes American business more competitive in the world. We’re spending $1800 on health care costs on every car that’s manufactured in America, compared to about $250 in Japan. Creates a huge disadvantage. What my plan specifically does for small business is it gives them market power that they don’t have today.

Not possible to get universal coverage without raising taxes

A: No, I do not. I spent a great deal of time studying this issue, working with health economists around the country. I’ve spent many months on this. I do not believe you can have universal health care without finding a source of revenue. We don’t get universal health care for free. You have to cover 47 million people who don’t have coverage. There’s going to be a cost associated with the transition from the health care system we have today to a truly universal and more efficient health care system. So, no, I do not believe it can be achieved without finding an additional source of revenue. [If you believe a politician who says that], they probably got a bridge in Brooklyn they want to sell you too.

Job-based insurance can be accomplished, not single-payer

A: It is true that single-payer health care systems in the world dramatically reduce costs and significantly reduce administrative costs, particularly compared to private insurers. It’s also true that a lot of people who are listening to this forum like the health insurance they have now and would like to keep it. And my judgment is to get it done so that we don’t spend another decade arguing about whether we keep the system we have now or actually have universal health care. I think my proposal, a truly universal plan, but doesn’t go directly to single-payer, can be accomplished. And second, it does give people choice. Now, it may be that choice gravitates towards a single-payer plan [by consumers choosing a Medicare-Plus option]--but consumers will decide that.

Silence is betrayal about universal healthcare-we can’t wait

Silence is a betrayal in America today. We cannot stand silent on 47 million of our own people who desperately need health care coverage and have no health care coverage. I am the first candidate to come out with a detailed, substantive, truly universal health care plan for every man, woman and child in America. And I want to say to you I don’t want to wait six or eight years to have universal health care. I want to start putting universal health care in place as soon as I am sworn into office in January of 2009, which is what America needs. We can’t wait.

Anybody who tells you that they’re going to have a universal health care plan, but they don’t have to find a new revenue source to pay for it -- they might have a bridge in Brooklyn they want to sell you too.

Expand Medicaid & create health markets to cover uninsured

A: I will be laying out details of a universal health care plan. We want to make sure everybody’s covered, we want to help middle class families with the costs, we want to try to create competition that doesn’t exist today. And I think the most effective way to do that is we take the 47 million people who don’t have health care coverage, we expand Medicaid, we provide subsidies for people who don’t have coverage. We ask employers to play a bigger role, which means they either have to have coverage, or they have to buy into what we’re calling health markets. One of the choices available in these health markets is the government plan. So people who like the idea of a single-payer insurer health plan, that is actually one of the alternatives that people can choose. We expand SCHIP; we expand Medicaid. The bottom line is we’re asking everybody to share in the responsibility of making health care work in this country.

Increase taxes to pay for universal insurance

A: It’d cost between $90 and $120 billion a year once it’s fully implemented.

Q: Would you be willing to raise taxes in order to help pay for this?

A: Yes, we’ll have to raise taxes. The, the only way you can pay for a health care plan is there has to be a revenue source. The revenue source I’m proposing is, is first we get rid of George Bush’s tax cuts for people who make over $200,000 a year. And then, we need to do a much better job of collecting the taxes that are already owed.

Q: But you’d be willing to increase taxes to provide health care?

A: Yes, absolutely.

Q: What about Social Security and Medicare? If we do nothing, you’ll have to raise taxes by a third to meet those demands of the entitlement programs.

A: Yes. Well, we have a huge challenge on this front. I think the starting place is Medicare, not Social Security, simply because Social Security is longer.

We need universal health insurance

It is morally wrong to leave so many Americans uninsured

Start providing health insurance for every child in America

Provide a bonus for states to get children insured

Cover every child and vulnerable adults

Cover 3m Hispanic kids & have National Translation Center

Require health insurance for every child

Voted NO on $40 billion per year for limited Medicare prescription drug benefit.

Voted YES on allowing reimportation of Rx drugs from Canada.

Voted YES on allowing patients to sue HMOs & collect punitive damages.

Voted NO on funding GOP version of Medicare prescription drug benefit.

Voted YES on including prescription drugs under Medicare.

Voted NO on limiting self-employment health deduction.

Establish "report cards" on HMO quality of care.

Promote Universal Access and Quality in Health Care
That more than 40 million Americans lack health insurance is one of our society’s most glaring inequities. Lack of insurance jeopardizes the health of disadvantaged Americans and also imposes high costs on everyone else when the uninsured lack preventive care and get treatment from emergency rooms. Washington provides a tax subsidy for insurance for Americans who get coverage from their employers but offers nothing to workers who don’t have job-based coverage.

Markets alone cannot assure universal access to health coverage. Government should enable all low-income families to buy health insurance. Individuals must take responsibility for insuring themselves and their families whether or not they qualify for public assistance.

Finally, to help promote higher quality in health care for all Americans, we need reliable information on the quality of health care delivered by health plans and providers; a “patient’s bill of rights” that ensures access to medically necessary care; and a system in which private health plans compete on the basis of quality as well as cost.

Goals for 2010
• Reduce the number of uninsured Americans by two-thirds through tax credits, purchasing pools, and other means.
• Create a system of reliable “report cards” on the quality of care delivered by health plans and providers.

Let states make bulk Rx purchases, and other innovations.

To: The Honorable Tommy G. Thompson, Secretary, Department of Health & Human Services

Dear Secretary Thompson:

As you know, prescription drug costs have been surging at double-digit rates for the last six years. The average annual increase 1999 through 2003 was a massive 16%, seven times the rate of general inflation.

These increases fall hardest on senior citizens and the uninsured. Their health needs are often great, and their low incomes often make these products unaffordable. They have no ability to use their combined purchasing power to negotiate reasonable prices. Taxpayers pay tens of billions of dollars for the purchase of drugs by Medicaid—an expense that could be reduced significantly if states are permitted to negotiate for the best prices from drug manufacturers.

As you know, the Supreme Court has just ruled that Maine's innovative program to reduce prescription drug costs for the uninsured and senior citizens is not a violation of the Medicaid law. As a result of this decision, Maine can use the combined buying power of Medicaid and individuals purchasing drugs on their own to negotiate lower prices with drug manufacturers. Twenty-nine other states supported the position taken by Maine, and there is broad interest in many states in initiating similar programs.

The Supreme Court's ruling, however, left open the possibility that if the Department of Health and Human Services makes a finding that the Maine program violates the Medicaid statute, the Department's action would be upheld by the Court. We urge you not to intervene to block Maine's program or similar statutes in other states that achieve savings for taxpayers, the elderly, and the uninsured. Such programs must be carefully implemented to assure that the poor are not denied access to needed drugs, but there is no justification for the federal government to deny states the ability to negotiate lower drug prices on behalf of their neediest citizens.

Rated 100% by APHA, indicating a pro-public health record.

The American Public Health Association (APHA) is the oldest and largest organization of public health professionals in the world, representing more than 50,000 members from over 50 occupations of public health. APHA is concerned with a broad set of issues affecting personal and environmental health, including federal and state funding for health programs, pollution control, programs and policies related to chronic and infectious diseases, a smoke-free society, and professional education in public health.

The following ratings are based on the votes the organization considered most important; the numbers reflect the percentage of time the representative voted the organization's preferred position.

End government propaganda on Medicare bill.

Recently, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), through a public relations firm, distributed Video News Releases (VNRs) to numerous local television news stations across the country. These VNRs contain pre-scripted news story packages and B-Roll designed to influence local news station to run stories complimentary of the new Medicare law recently signed by President Bush. However, these VNRs may mislead many news stations because they do not identify that they are produced by the government. In addition, these materials are currently being evaluated to determine whether they are illegal "covert propaganda."

We urge you to immediately warn stations not to use these materials and pull any stories that use them.

These tapes can be identified as follows: Two English-language versions begin with B-Roll of video slides promoting the new Medicare law, followed by interview soundbites from Tommy Thompson, Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services and Leslie Norwalk, Acting Deputy Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid (CMS). Following these soundbites, a complete television news package is run, with a voice-over by a fictional reporter named "Karen Ryan." Following the news package, more B-Roll is provided, including scenes of President Bush's rally at the signing of the bill, scenes from a pharmacy and scenes of seniors playing table games.

It is critical to the credibility of an independent news media that covert government propaganda be rejected for use by news organizations. We also believe that honest government should not resort to such deceptive tactics, and it is our belief that these materials violate the above-mentioned Federal law. Thank you for your cooperation with this request.