Tom Price: Health-Care May be Working for Government, But Not for Patients
Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price says it's essential that Republicans succeed in efforts to reform health care in America.
“The American people understand that our current health-care system for those in the individual markets and small group market, that exchange market, simply isn’t working. You’ve got premiums that are up, you’ve got deductibles that are up, you’ve got a third of the counties in this nation that only have one insurance issuer providing coverage,” Price told the FOX Business Network’s Maria Bartiromo.
“That’s a system that’s not working for patients, it may be working for government, but it’s not working for patients.”
Price said health care reform will ensure that specific consumers get the care they need. “We need a Medicaid system that works for the Medicaid recipient, we need an exchange system for the individual and small group market that works, that’s bringing down premiums, that’s making it so that folks can actually see their own doctor and get the kind of treatment that they want and that they need.”
Price said reform presents an opportunity to shift control over health care away from the federal government and into the hands of patients along with their families and doctors.
“We’ve got so much opportunity to put in place a system that will actually work for patients—where patients and families and doctors are in charge of health care and not Washington DC."
President Trump, Price said, is well aware of the importance of making health care more affordable and accessible for all Americans.
“The president recognizes that the priorities of making certain that we have a system that’s affordable for everybody, that’s accessible for everybody, that’s of the highest quality and provides choices for patients. That’s what the American people want and desire, those are the principals of health care almost regardless of your political stripe.”
Price, a former orthopedic doctor himself, was optimistic that health care reform could still be achieved.
“I think that folks will coalesce around a very positive plan, a plan that is, as the president has said, will bring down premiums, will make it so deductibles aren’t skyrocketing and off the roof.”