Overview

Health care costs have doubled in the past 10 years.

And without health care reform, the United States is projected to spend over $40 trillion on health care, just in the next decade. Premiums are estimated to double in the next eight years.  For Coloradans that is a jump from $11,195 to $25,119 for an average cost of family employer-provided insurance.  For an average cost of individual employer-provided insurance the jump will be $4,024 to $9,455.

Experts estimate that thirty percent of health care spending – up to $12 trillion dollars – will be wasted on ineffective care, pointless red tape, and counterproductive treatments that can actually harm patients. 

But health care reform can save roughly $3 trillion over the next decade and $39 billion in Colorado.  

The solutions are straightforward and detailed in our most recent reports.  They include (all savings are over next ten years just for Colorado):

Streamline Billing - Cutting red tape and streamlining health care billing will reduce $5 billion of waste.

Health IT - Adoption of health information technology and electronical medical records will save $2.59 billion.

Insurer Efficiency - Requiring insurers to spend at least 85% of premium dollars on actual health benefits will save $1.44 billion.

Comparative Effectiveness Research and Evidence-based Medicine - Investing in unbiased research into the best treatments, drugs and devices will lower costs by $6.9 billion.

Restricting Prescription Drug Advertising - Restricting marketing would allow more prescriptions to be written based on unbiased science and reduce costs by $3.02 billion.

Payment Reform and Prevention - Creating financial incentives for proven treatment strategies, including managing chronic diseases, would lead to more primary care and better coordination and lower costs $15.82 billion.

Establish a Public Insurance Option - By establishing a public insurance option that uses the above reforms would expand consumer choice and force private insurers to be more competitive reducing costs by $3.31 billion.

Ending Government Overpayments - Currently, a pair of federal government policies enrich insurance and drug companies at taxpayer expense.  Eliminating these backdoor subsidies would save $1.34 billion. 

The powerful interests such as health insurers and drug companies are lining up to protect the status quo and are lobbying Congress hard.  Congress needs to put families and businesses first and implement these strong cost-saving measures which will save Colorado families and businesses money and improve the quality of our health care.