Gingrich Sets The Record Straight On Healthcare Reform, USA

Main Category: Public Health
Also Included In: Medicare / Medicaid / SCHIP
Article Date: 25 Feb 2009 - 3:00 PDT

email to a friend   printer friendly   opinions  

The following statement, in response to President Obama's remarks, may be attributed to former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, Founder of the Center for Health Transformation:

President Obama is right: we cannot wait any longer to fix the problems we face in health - they are beyond critical. We waste billions of dollars every day and people die unnecessarily every day at the hands of a broken, fragmented healthcare system.

Where there are challenges, there are also opportunities, and we at the Center for Health Transformation believe that the most important thing we must keep in mind is to ensure that health is the driving focus of the health reform debate. By reforming the delivery system so that every American gets the best health at the lowest cost, we can expand insurance to each and every citizen.

There are four specific priorities. First, we must encourage the adoption of best practices that work. We need to surface what is actually working today to save lives and save money and then design public policy to encourage their widespread adoption. The employer wellness programs that help improve their employees' health while keeping cost trends close to zero; the hospitals that cut preventable medication errors by 92%. These kinds of real-world solutions should drive policy-not the other way around.

Second, we must focus on health information technology. Modernizing both the clinical and administrative sides of healthcare must be at the top of any agenda to fix our health system. President Obama and the Congress made significant progress by including substantial incentives for providers to adopt and use modern tools in the course of treatment. Putting technology into the hands of providers is one important step, and now we must ensure that there is an infrastructure to truly interconnect everyone in our system.

Third, we must root out and prevent healthcare fraud. The current level of fraud is astonishing - perhaps more than $200 billion a year. This robs honest businesses, steals from government, and compromises the care of every American. If we implement the right electronic systems to monitor claims and procurement in virtually real time, much like the credit card industry does, the savings could more than pay for the investment in health IT, expanding insurance coverage and put Medicare and Medicaid on sound financial footing. Remember, you can never catch a criminal with paper.

Fourth, we must permanently eliminate the broken models of government budgeting and scoring. We need innovative and transparent models, such as new science and technology based investment budgets that can be scored over a generation of returns.

There is a time for Republicans and Democrats to stand their ground when they must; but it is equally as important to have the courage to collaborate when they should. Health reform is one of those moments. With these priorities, the president will find eager and energetic Republican partners if he truly seeks them.

Source
Michelle S. Stein
Communications Director
The Gingrich Group/Center for Health Transformation
http://www.healthtransformation.net

• Additional
• References
• Citations