New Report: Without Reform, Health Costs Will double
Economic Recovery Bill and Broader Health Reform Urgently Needed
Sacramento, CA— Without action from Congress, premiums and deductibles for residents of California with employer provided insurance will nearly double by 2016, according to a new report released today by the California Public Interest Research Group (CALPIRG).
“Unchecked, health care premiums will double by 2016,” said Mike Russo CALPIRG Healthcare Advocate, “The health care reforms in President Obama’s economic recovery plan are indispensable first steps to addressing this crisis.”
CALPIRG attributes these high costs to wasteful health spending and the insurance and pharmaceutical industries that profit from it. The report concludes that one out of three dollars spent on health care fuels profits for special interests without delivering better health care for patients.
The report spotlights two important categories of wasteful health spending in California:
• $24.86 billion each year was spent on inappropriate, ineffective and uncoordinated care which can actually cause harm to patients.
• An estimated $72.9 billion in red tape is created by bloated insurance company bureaucracy.
Russo lauds the recovery plan’s $24.1 billion investment in the health care infrastructure. He states, “This legislation funding of health information technology, evidence-based prevention, and comparative effectiveness research will enable reforms which we discuss in the report.”
The CALPIRG report calls for additional longer-term reforms that crack down on drug company marketing, rein in insurance industry red tape, and reform provider payment to encourage more effective medical care.
“This year, a new President and a new Congress have an opportunity to pass broad health reform that tames the waste, inefficiency, and skewed incentives that drive up our health care costs,” noted Russo “California’s families can’t afford to miss this opportunity.”
###
CALPIRG is a statewide, nonprofit non partisan citizen-based advocacy organization.
