• Democratic myth: If you like what you have, you can keep it.
Fact: This bill does nothing to protect you from losing the coverage you have or losing access to the health providers you are currently afforded.
o 120 million people could lose their current coverage as a result of the government-run plan reimbursing at Medicare rates (Lewin Group study)
o 4.7 million people will lose their jobs. If you lose your job, you will lose the health coverage you currently get through that job.
o Nothing in the bill requires your doctor or your pharmacist to treat you if you must enter in the government-run plan. In fact, physicians are opposed to the government-plan in this bill.
• Democratic myth: The bill will expand and improve the availability of health care for you, not ration it.
Fact: The majority’s bill allows the government to ration health care.
o The government will set payment rates for your providers. After the first three years, these rates could be as low as the government determines is necessary to control cost.
o The government can take research that has been done to determine the clinical effectiveness of certain drugs, treatments, and medical procedures and decide, based on their cost, that the government will not pay your providers to give you them, even if the providers believe they are the best course of medical treatment for you.
• Democratic myth: All businesses will benefit from insurance market reforms.
Fact: An 8 percent employer tax is hardly a benefit to employers.
• Democratic myth: “We want competition, but we don’t want the public plan to win because that will drive out private insurance.” – U.S. Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee
Fact: “I know many people here today are single-payor advocates and so am I … those of us that are pushing for a public insurance option don’t disagree with the goal. This is not a principled fight. This is a fight about strategy, about getting there and I believe we will.” – U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill.
