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The Issues

Health Care Reform

Real, Comprehensive Health Care Reform To Drive Down Costs And Cover All Vermonters

Across the state, small businesses, towns, and families are struggling financially. One of the top reasons is the never-ending escalation of health care costs and premiums.

The cost of health care in Vermont is going up a million dollars a day. Premiums for municipal workers went up 30% this year alone. Health care is driving the financial crisis in the teacher retirement fund. Yet thousands of Vermonters still have no insurance and many with high deductibles put off going to the doctor until after a preventable condition balloons into a devastating and expensive illness.

These costs must be brought under control if we are to eliminate our deficits and allow small businesses to invest in jobs, not ever-escalating premiums. While many of us hoped a "public option" would emerge from Congress, we know that it did not.

As Governor, my administration will harness the expertise in our state to create the Vermont Health Care Plan. The plan will ensure everyone is covered, everyone contributes and we reduce costs by changing the way we manage reimbursement in our state.

1. Cover everyone in Vermont through a self-insurance program, as many large companies do, to reduce administrative costs, and give us new buying power to change our reimbursement system and reduce prescription drug costs.
2. Pay health care providers for health care outcomes (making people healthier), not for the quantity of each procedure or how fancy a piece of medical equipment the hospital uses.
3. Ensure every Vermont family has a primary care physician and is able to access preventative care as early as possible.
4. Make easily available online information about what Vermont health care providers charge for each procedure so Vermonters can see what we are paying for.
5. Create a statewide budget so hospitals have predictable resources to serve the community rather than having to make up for Medicaid underfunding and patients who cannot pay by overcharging everyone else.
6. Re-import prescription drugs from Canada at a fraction of the cost of purchasing in the US and distribute them through local pharmacies.
7. Provide incentives to Vermonters who make healthy lifestyle choices, including activities like regular exercise and outcomes like reductions in blood sugar and blood pressure. Provide direct investment in after school programs that demonstrate similar impacts for young people.
8. Develop a statewide health care IT system to increase efficiency and decrease medical errors.
9. Increase opportunities for children and low-income adults to access healthy, locally grown food through partnerships between farmers and schools, foodbanks and after school programs.