Ed Gillespie on Health Care

Ebola: Impose a flight ban from West Africa

Warner and Gillespie found common ground in their criticism of the Obama administration's handling of the Ebola outbreak. Warner said the administration should have moved more quickly in setting up Ebola screenings at major U.S. airports, while Gillespie said the U.S. should have already imposed a flight ban on planes coming from West Africa.

Benefits from GOP resistance to the new health law

1993: HillaryCare bureaucracy meant job-killing mandates

I asked my old friends at the Joint Economic Committee to do not only an analysis of the job-killing aspect of the employer mandate, but literally draw up how the proposed new system would look on a flow chart.

We ran the resulting "bureaucracy" diagram along with the glossary of terms contained in the bill in an October 13, 1993 Wall Stre

Market principles: portability & tort reform

1. Consumers should pay the first dollar: Restore the primacy of the consumer as a player in the process.
2. Coverage should be portable: In the current system, every time a worker leaves or loses a job, he or she also forfeits health care coverage.
3. Tax treatment should be equitable: Today's tax code provides unlimited tax relief for the purchase of health insurance as long as it comes through employers; Americans purchasing individual insurance outside the workplace must pay with after-tax dollars.
4. End the lawsuit lottery: Our current medical liability system is broken.
5. All adults participate: 25% to 50% of the uninsured choose to forgo the purchase of health insurance.

Follow principles like portability & universal participation

1. Consumers should pay the first dollar: Restore the primacy of the consumer as a player in the process.
2. Coverage should be portable: In the current system, every time a worker leaves or loses a job, he or she also forfeits health care coverage.
3. Tax treatment should be equitable: Today's tax code provides unlimited tax relief for the purchase of health insurance as long as it comes through employers; Americans purchasing individual insurance outside the workplace must pay with after-tax dollars.
4. End the lawsuit lottery: Our current medical liability system is broken.
5. All adults participate: 25% to 50% of the uninsured choose to forgo the purchase of health insurance.

Broken medical liability system costs $28B per year

Malpractice costs include lawyers' fees, damage awards, and settlements in cases in which doctors know they are innocent but settle to avoid long and costly legal proceedings. These costs are passed on to patients, and it is a particularly undue burden on lower-income families. Malpractice costs account for about 2% of health care spending, or about $28 billion per year.

Medical liability reforms would secure an injured patient's ability to get quicker compensation for economic losses, while reducing junk lawsuits and excessive jury awards that jeopardize access to care.

Reform Medicare to save affordable program for future

I have always taken care to make sure Republican officials add the "because clause."

"We need to cut taxes, BECAUSE tax relief will spur investment that will create jobs."

"We need to reform Medicare, BECAUSE we can provide health care more affordably while saving the program for future generations."

The "because clause" helps make sure your candidate is talking about people, not numbers.