On the recordFebruary 23, 2010
As my coauthor from Colorado mentions, this isn't about being anti-insurance. This is being pro-competition and pro-consumer. It is well past time to put the patient first in the health care system. We heard during the last hour some of our colleagues from the other side of the aisle talking about the need to protect the doctor-patient relationship. What decade are they living in? The doctor-patient relationship has been invaded for decades now. My sister who is a pediatrician many days spends more time on the phone with the insurance company than she spends with patients, insurance companies whose profit motive is based on denying people care, not providing people with care. In a good, competitive market, the insurance companies will profit based on providing quality insurance and coverage to patients, not by highly concentrated markets. This is about putting that doctor back in control of care, instead of that insurance company back in control of care, because through the free market, we can ensure that consumers are moving towards the insurance companies that provide that kind of quality care. So this is about being pro-consumer and about being pro- patient and pro-competition.
