A Letter to Senator Erpenbach - STOP!

By George Lightbourn

Dear Senator Erpenbach – Jon,

I wanted to write to you about the health care in Wisconsin before the ink is dry on the legislation you’ve been drafting.  I shouldn’t have been surprised when news broke that a major health care initiative was to be folded into the state budget after only one perfunctory hearing.  But I was surprised, surprised that you’d be associated with such a blatantly political maneuver.  You are better than that. 

We’ve all read the poll results that have consistently told us that Wisconsin families are troubled by the state of health care.  But before we go off and change the system, let’s make sure the changes are making things better, not worse. 

It’s marvelous rhetoric to talk about providing every citizen with the same benefits enjoyed by members of the State Senate.  But it’s just a slogan.  It might be the stuff that your party leadership thinks they need as part of a Senate Democratic campaign strategy, but health care reform is far too important to mingle rhetoric with policy. 

Speaking of surprises, it might surprise you to discover that conservatives are completely with you in pushing to reform the health care system.  Conservative criticism of plans put forth by organized labor and other left-leaning thinkers should not be interpreted as defense of the status quo, far from it.  Health care has the unique ability to bring the left and right together, if only to support the all too vague notion of reform.  But in our rage against the current system, many of us conveniently overlook the positive elements of the American health care system.  Let us not ignore the tremendous advances in diagnosis and treatment, much of which is attributable to technological and pharmacological innovations.  We Americans have access to the most amazing life-giving treatments, without being subjected to the mandated queuing that many other Western economies endure.

Yes, conservatives are just as outraged as you are by the increasing bite the medical industry is taking out of the GNP.  They are just as outraged as you that too many of our fellow citizens are given access to the medical system only through the back door, the emergency room. 

We do not ever want to look back on the current times as the good old days.  But that is exactly the risk you run by even contemplating a big-government, single payer system.  While it might hold the prospect of providing health insurance for everyone, we have to ask at what cost?  Try looking ahead, well past the next election cycle, to the time when this new big system has been in place for a decade or more.  You don’t have to speculate what will have happened to health care. Simply look at those models of America’s centralized health care: Medicaid and Medicare.  Both grew from humble, well-intentioned beginnings and both have become major contributors to what is running up the cost and diminishing the quality of health care.  Cost containment under these big, centralized systems comes from rationing.  They tell us what care we can have and they tell our doctor how he or she ought to practice medicine. 

So, if this centralized, single-payer plan won’t do the trick, what is the answer?    The answer is to give me and every other citizen the information we need and the capacity to shop around for health care, just like we shop around for everything else we buy.  Personally, I don’t want my employer or government or even my wife to shop for my health care.  And I sure don’t want an insurance company shopping for me. 

Here are some of the elements of a system that would make true change for the better:  

• I want to know what doctors and which hospitals are best. 
• I want to know what things cost, from the routine office visits to the most specialized cancer surgery.
• I understand that I need to have more of my own money in play, but I also want to be able to shop around.  I want to make sure I’m getting the most for my money.

You’ve probably seen through me.  I want a free market health care system.  I want the system to be placed in the hands of consumers – not just a few wealthy consumers but all consumers.  I want government and politically appointed boards to stay as far away from my health as possible.  They shouldn’t be taxing me and they shouldn’t be telling me the best way to be treated. 

I’ve been in the state employee system you want to provide to all of Wisconsin.  It’s far from perfect.  I’ve known too many people that had to run a maze set up by their HMO before they could receive treatment they needed.  So don’t tell me I have choice by choosing a health insurance company.  If that’s a choice, it’s a Hobson’s Choice.

Jon, we both know the chances of the “Healthy Wisconsin” becoming law are remote.  The Governor was last seen running away from it even before the details were released.  And I’ll be interested to see how public employees, including teachers, react when you explain that they will be paying more out of pocket at the same time their choices are significantly limited.  When it does get dropped from the budget, maybe we can begin a dialogue about true, consumer-driven health care reform for all of Wisconsin. 

Sincerely,