Former GAO Head Supports Limited Universal Health Care

crossposted from unbossed

In a speech Tuesday, April 8, at the American Hospital Association's annual membership meeting, David Walker, who just recently resigned as Comptroller General of the Government Accountability Office, said that he supported

Providing universal coverage for "basic and essential" health care services is one part of an overarching strategy to address the financial crisis in the health care system.

According to a subscription-only BNA report.

Former GAO Comptroller General has just move to head the Peter Peterson Foundation.

David M. Walker is President and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Peter G. Peterson Foundation (The Peterson Foundation). As CEO, he is charged with leading the Peterson Foundation's efforts to: enhance public understanding of the nature and urgency of selected key sustainability challenges that threaten America’s future; propose sensible and workable solutions to address these challenges, and; build public and political will to do something about them. This includes efforts in connection with selected fiscal, entitlement, health care, energy, education, and nuclear non-proliferation issues.

In his speech, according to BNA, Walker said:

"I pick 'basic and essential' very carefully," the former head of the Government Accountability Office said, adding that such services would be "based on broad-based societal needs that are affordable and sustainable over time," while "anything above basic and essential is not guaranteed."

Walker also called for a national health care spending budget, national evidenced-based practice standards, and personal accountability for health, interconnected issues he said need to be dealt with as a "package."

These issues need to be addressed to help achieve comprehensive health care reform, he said. "One thing that could bankrupt America is its health care costs," and the health care system requires "dramatic and fundamental reforms," he said. "It's not a matter of if, it's only a matter of when."

BNA further reported:

Basic and essential care includes "inoculations against infectious disease, certain wellness and preventative care services that clearly are in our common interest and are cost-effective in a broad pool over time, and protection against financial ruin due to unexpected catastrophic accident or illness," he said.

Such a system would be different than the current system because while some have more than adequate health care, others are significantly underinsured or uninsured.

The way in which the government pays for the current health care system is unsustainable, Walker said, contending that the "federal government needs to have a budget on what it spends on health care" and that there "have to be triggers."

Drawing from numerous statistics that he said demonstrate the unsustainability of national health care spending, Walker said the average annual growth rate of health care spending per capita was 4.9 percent from 1960 to 2005, while the gross domestic product grew at an annual per capita rate of 2.3 percent.

You will notice that "sustainable" appears as a key issue in Walker's speech. The Peterson Foundation is pledging $1 Billion to promote its mission.

To find out more of what he means, turn to the mission statement of the Peterson Foundation.

The mission of The Peter G. Peterson Foundation is to enhance public understanding of the nature and urgency of selected key sustainability challenges that threaten America’s future, to propose sensible and workable solutions to address these challenges and to build public will to do something about them.

The Foundation's initial focus will be on:

   * Unsustainable entitlement benefits.  As 78 million baby boomers retire, America’s unfunded entitlement promises (i.e., Medicare and Social Security) exceed three times the annual GDP of the country.
     
   * Unsustainable current account deficits, primarily accounted for by unprecedented trade deficits.  Now at twice previous record levels, these leave America dangerously dependent on foreign capital and require America to save much more both at the national and personal levels.
     
   * Unsustainable and ballooning healthcare costs.  These costs are now more than twice as high per capita as the rest of the developed world with no appreciable differences in health outcomes or longevity.  And, this healthcare system leaves 47 million Americans uninsured.

   * Unsustainable and gluttonous energy consumption - and its first cousin, global warming. With less than five percent of the world’s population, America accounts for 25 percent of the world’s consumption of oil.  This gluttonous consumption leaves America dangerously dependent on unfriendly and unstable foreign sources of oil and, in some cases, fuels terrorist activities.  Most energy experts agree that, of course, over the longer term, building alternative energy sources is important, but if the energy challenge is to be resolved over the near-to-mid term, it must be resolved, basically, on the demand side through conservation and not the supply side.
     
   * Unsustainable competitive gaps in our educational system.  America’s economic leadership in an increasing competitive global economy is not sustainable when half of the young in our urban areas and 30 percent of all young Americans do not graduate from high school.  Nor is it sustainable in an increasingly technological world where the capacity to do basic research and to invent the next big technologies is crucial and where Asian countries are now producing more master degree and PhD technology graduates than the United States.  Furthermore, America's education system is not doing an adequate job in the areas of financial literacy and civics.
     
   * The undeniable, transcendent threat to our collective future: The potential for nuclear and biological warfare materials falling into the hands of terrorists.