The Health Care Blog: Op-Ed: Healthcare Reform- Why have the objectives been abandoned so quickly?

By DR. ALBERT WAXMAN In the campaign of 2008 and the first six months of 2009, the call for healthcare reform has been a refreshing and important theme. It has been widely recognized that 1. Healthcare costs are out of control. You cannot have healthcare expenses inflating at 8% in an economy that is growing in the best of times at 4%. (today, the current inflation rate is negative 1.3%) 2. 47 million Americans need coverage 3. 14,000 Americans lose their insurance everyday 4. Medicare is in peril, and along with Medicaid, the combination of ever-increasing costs are the main drivers of this government’s budget deficits that threaten our economic future. Our politicians pledged to deliver comprehensive solutions to address these problems and they promised budget neutrality. The President told us, that health care costs are driving our deficit; that the current trend is unacceptable, unsustainable, and we are going to change it in 2009. Now we know they did not mean it. Continue Reading