(Dr. Steve Sauerberg, Republican candidate for Senate against Dick Durbin, unveiled his healthcare plan this morning.)
United States Senate Candidate Dr. Steve Sauerberg Unveils Healthcare Plan:
"Your Healthcare, Your Choice" Plan Will Provide all Americans with Access to Quality Affordable Healthcare
(Waukegan, IL) - Standing outside of a suburban medical office in Hinsdale, Steve Sauerberg, M.D., a Republican candidate for the United States Senate unveiled his healthcare plan - entitled "Your Healthcare, Your Choice." "My prescription for reform is straightforward. My plan empowers families and individuals and trusts them to make their own healthcare decisions, not nameless, faceless government bureaucrats in Springfield or Washington. My plan doesn't rely on layer after layer of new, ineffective government bureaucracy," said Sauerberg. "Instead, my healthcare plan employs free-market principles and the private sector to create a system that emphasizes individual and family ownership, restrains runaway costs, increases consumer options, reigns in the burden that frivolous lawsuits impose on consumers, removes barriers to cutting edge innovations, and most importantly provides access for all Americans to affordable and high quality healthcare."
The Your Healthcare, Your Choice Plan builds on simple free-market themes. First, in order to promote coverage for every man, woman and child in the United States through the private sector, the government needs to encourage portability, competition, accessibility and individual ownership of quality medical insurance. Second, to protect patients and providers, and to dramatically reduce healthcare costs we need to end frivolous lawsuits. Third, we must encourage innovation and promote best-practices at all levels of our healthcare system. Finally, without ending fraud and abuse in Medicare and Medicaid we cannot fundamentally reform our healthcare system. "This urgent task can be done if we have the will," continued Sauerberg. "Elect me and I will lead and win this fight."
The ten components of the Sauerberg Your Healthcare, Your Choice Plan are 1) portability, 2) competition, 3) accessibility, 4) individual ownership with tax rebates and health vouchers, 5) healthy living tax credits, 6) simple and uniform paperwork, 7) physician disclosure and accountability, 8) penalties for denial of coverage by insurance companies, 9) ending frivolous lawsuits, 10) eliminating fraud and waste in Medicare and Medicaid and mandatory prison sentences for those who commit fraud.
Sauerberg's plan puts healthcare decisions in the hands of individuals and families by emphasizing individual ownership of medical insurance. Tax benefits currently given to employers for providing insurance to employees will be converted to tax rebates for individuals and families, or health vouchers for those who don't pay federal income tax. The plan provides an individual with a $2,000 tax rebate and families with a $5,000 tax rebate. "At the end of the day, we should trust individuals and families to make healthcare decisions, not government bureaucrats," said Sauerberg.
In addition to individual ownership, the Sauerberg plan lowers costs through increased competition. "My plan will bring increased competition and will decrease healthcare costs by allowing individuals and families to purchase the health coverage of their choice in any state," said Sauerberg. "We can't allow insurance companies and state bureaucracies to prevent consumers from selecting and purchasing their desired healthcare plans. By forcing insurance companies to compete locally, statewide, by region, and nationally - rather than just on a state by state basis - my plan will reduce the cost of health insurance, enhance quality, and breed innovation."
The Your Healthcare, Your Choice plan also seeks to end frivolous lawsuits. "In order to protect patients and providers and to dramatically reduce healthcare costs we need to end frivolous lawsuits," continued Sauerberg. "Under my plan, the federal government will offer financial assistance to states to establish Administrative Health Courts tasked with assessing each case, making a determination about whether a healthcare provider is responsible for a patient's injury, and if so, what remedy is appropriate. Administrative Health Courts will lower healthcare costs and save taxpayers millions of dollars by removing frivolous lawsuits from state judicial systems."
Finally, Sauerberg's plan will also eliminate Medicare and Medicaid fraud. The plan will create a Medicare and Medicaid Fraud Task Force housed in the Federal Bureau of Investigations, consisting of FBI agents and local law enforcement officials. The Medicare and Medicaid Fraud Task Force will be responsible for cracking down on the Medicare and Medicaid fraud cartels that cost taxpayers tens of billions of dollars each year. "Fraud and abuse in the Medicare and Medicaid systems constitute a serious and growing problem," said Sauerberg. "The Your Healthcare, Your Choice Plan calls for tough punishment for those who abuse the system, including mandatory, one strike and you're out sentences for those found guilty of Medicare or Medicaid fraud," and stiff penalties for insurance companies who deny coverage to individuals and families.
"Now is the time for real change - unlike career politicians, I offer more than just empty rhetoric and promises of big government bureaucratic driven solutions," concluded Sauerberg. "I offer sensible ideas and fiscally responsible solutions to fix our healthcare system."
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Sauerberg for U.S. Senate - 4700 Gilbert Avenue, Suite 47, PMB 249 Western Springs, IL 60558. For more information on Steve's campaign please visit our website at www.sauerberg2008.com
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