Many New Mexicans say it’s time for a New Mexico Health Security Plan. I agree.
This Legislature should pass the Health Security Planning and Design legislation (HB203), to establish an approximately four-year, publicly accountable, transparent process to design that plan. Health Security is backed by a huge coalition of groups, including the Hispanic Farmers and Ranchers. Las Cruces, Anthony, and Doña Ana County support it. (There’s no real opposition except big insurance companies.) Three studies have concluded that creating our own health plan will be a great investment, through which we can confront problems of rising healthcare costs and a large uninsured population.
New Mexico’s Health Security Plan would insure almost all residents. (Federal retirees and military folks would continue with their federal plans, and ERISA-covered health plans could merge with the Plan or not.) Plan members would have guaranteed access to comprehensive, quality healthcare coverage, regardless of income, health, or employment. The Plan guarantees choice of provider, even across state lines, and is at least as good a benefit package as state employees receive. Hospitals and physicians would remain private.
The Plan would be run by an independent, non-governmental 15-member Health Security Plan Commission, with ten commissioners from around the state representing consumers and employers, and five representing providers and health facilities. The Open Meetings Act and Inspection of Public Records Act would apply, but patient confidentiality would be protected.
HB203 continues a carefully considered approach. It creates the Health Security Planning and Design Board to do the detailed design of the Plan, and pass that on on to the Commission. The Commission will complete the final design elements, have a cost analysis conducted, and develop a funding system, before obtaining final legislative and executive approval to begin enrollment. The Plan could begin operations in 2025.
Rather than all paying for a segmented system of hundreds of insurance plans, at greater cost and with greater complexity, everyone would be in one large pool, sharing the risk and reducing administrative costs. Public and private dollars would go into one fund, including federal and state healthcare money, Affordable Care Act federal subsidies, plus individual premiums and employer contributions (with caps). Employers could cover all or part of an employee’s premium obligations.
The Plan, like Medicare, makes private insurance supplemental. As with Canada’s excellent system, private companies participate, and make profits, but don’t run the system. Nor should they. (They sure don’t in most well-run countries.)
The Affordable Care Act provides for “State Innovation Waivers” that let states develop alternative health coverage systems that need not rely on the complex private insurance system. States are eligible for federal tax credits, subsidies, and Medicaid expansion funds.
A friend says, “It’s too big for New Mexico.” But it isn’t. As mentioned, we don’t move forward unless the detailed design satisfies both the Legislature and the Governor. That’s a limited investment for a possibly huge payoff. Meanwhile, millionaire CEOs of insurance companies get richer off our timidity.
Are we too small and too poor? Decades ago, Saskatchewan, Canada’s poorest province, enacted a healthcare plan that worked so well it ultimately became Canada’s national plan.
We have a similar opportunity to light the way. Please read up on HB203; and if you like it, tell your state legislators. Our county contains many poor and uninsured families, some with children. We owe it to them to at least make our best effort at this.
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[The above column appeared this morning, Sunday, 7 February 2021, in the Las Cruces Sun-News, as well as on the newspaper's website and KRWG’s website. A related radio commentary will air during the week on KRWG (90.7) and KTAL-LP. (101.5 – http://www.lccommunityradio.org/), and is available on demand on KRWG’s site.]
[To read more about the Health Security Act, and where it stands in the Legislature, go to http://www.nmhealthsecurity.org/ , the Health Security Campaign’s website, or check HB 203’s progress at http://www.nmlegis.gov/. To get involved, email dsmillen@msn.com. We discussed this recently on “Speak Up, Las Cruces!” (http://www.lccommunityradio.org/). I didn’t find much opposition to this bill, but would be interested in hearing from any group that strongly opposes it. I’d be interested in why, and possibly in discussing it further on the radio show.]
[To me, it seems worth trying. Given the extra money that goes into the administrative costs of so many insurers and the costs and headaches for doctors and other health providers of doing the paperwork for different entities, plus the excessive profits, plus the economies of buying in bulk, the concept seems promising. The need is obvious, with so many uninsured families in New Mexico, many of them poor. Unless someone shows us why it won’t work, why wouldn’t we try? Habit, timidity, and the lobbying of insurance companies aren’t adequate reasons to hang back.]
The road to Cuevas
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