A new version of the “public option” has been released. Now, it is going to allow states to decide whether they want the public option or other wise. This has been backed by Governor Howard Dean, the ex-Governor of Vermont.

I have always been jittery when it comes to the clause of the public option in the health care reform bill. I think it is way too close to single payer universal health-care. Though I am not against single-payer universal health-care, I think that we should try all other alternatives first.

However, both parties did not even make an inkling of a suggestion to increase the competition other than the public option. That was all that they could come up with. Hence, when the public option was removed from the bill, I decided to oppose the bill and think that we should kill it.

Right now, there is a compromise being chiseled out by Senators Chuck Schumer and Tom Carper. It is a very simple thing, if you really feel that your state does not want “government in health-care”; your state can opt-out and let other states that want it keep it. It is incredibly straight forward.

That being said, I think that there should be an additional condition to this option. Right now, if you go to the emergency room and you cannot pay for your operation as you do not have health insurance, it would be the Federal Government that has to foot the bill. They cannot just let you die.

Lets assume that this clause is passed, and some states passed public option and some other states did not. If you were a citizen of a State that does not have the public option, you do not have health insurance and you need to go the emergency room, there is a higher chance that the Federal government has to step in. Why should the I, via my federal taxes, be paying for another State’s irresponsibility?

Therefore, should this compromise of the health-care bill be passed, I think that the cost of uninsured health care should be passed on to the States. In that way, whether they have the public option or not, they pay for it. The federal government should lower taxes and the states would increase the taxes. Overall, it should not effect us financially.

I think that the continued opposition to this really underlines how much potential the public option has to be successful. The Republicans fear that this would over time force their states to also adopt the public option. Do you really think that all the 60% of the people in the poll that support the public option are liberals?

When California has the public option and people start to receive health-care as a result of it, don’t you think Arizonans would demand that their state have it too? They know that it would lead to the public option coming up in all the states. In fact, people like me think that it could even lead to a single payer system in the future.

An additional benefit to that is that the State would also be interested in preventive measures so that they can save money. They would rather invest in fitness regimes for children rather than paying their bills when they are older. It is much easier to execute this at a state or local even level rather than the federal government being involved in it.

However, as of now, there is no movement of this new public option plan. Until it has passed the committee votes, I would not be calling for support to kill this bill!

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