Thomas Daschle: “recently, a new study confirmed a trend that most American families and businesses have known and felt for the past 3…”

“recently, a new study confirmed a trend that most American families and businesses have known and felt for the past 3 years. Health care costs are rising at unsustainable rates, straining family budgets, weakening our economy, hampering job growth and forcing millions more Americans every year to go without insurance. According to the annual survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation, health premiums increased 11.2 percent last year, more than five times the rate of wages. This is the fourth consecutive year of double-digit increases. Since 2000, health care premiums have increased by 59 percent and 5 million fewer Americans have access to employer health care coverage. Last month the Census Bureau also reported that in 2003 alone, the number of uninsured Americans jumped by 1.4 million. Seniors are among the hardest hit. In addition to facing record increases in the price of prescription drugs, Medicare recipients recently learned they will be forced to pay a 17.5 percent increase in premiums, the steepest increase in Medicare's history. The true costs of this crisis can't be depicted by statistics. There is no way to measure the stress caused by exorbitant health care bills. There is no way to measure the cost of the fear of families who worry that they are one layoff, one bad crop, one accident, or one illness away from being totally vulnerable, and they fell helpless to protect themselves.”