Your health care premium will be adjusted based on your income. If you qualify for Medicaid, you will not pay a premium. If you are wealthy, there will probably be a “ceiling” on the income on which your premium will be based. Your employer might pay a portion of the premium. The exact percentage has not been determined by a health care economist. When it is determined the information will be readily available. It is likely your premium will be less that it would be if you remain covered by a private, commercial plan and your benefits will be as good or better than your benefits with your private commercial plan.

Medicare is a government program for people 65 and older and people who are disabled. The program has been in existence for over 60 years. the administrative cost for Medicare is 2% The administrative cost for private commercial health insurance companies is between 15-20%.

Your current private commercial health care plan is probably not as comprehensive as the proposed publicly funded, privately delivered health care plan for all Coloradans. Your premiums will be less compared to what your premiums will be if you remain in a private commercial plan because you won’t be paying for unnecessary administrative costs. Also, the current traditional Medicare plan is not as comprehensive as the proposed Colorado plan for Coloradans 65 years of age and older and people with permanent disabilities. Many Coloradans say they like their health insurance plan because so far it has covered the cost of almost everything they needed. You could keep your plan even if a ballot measure passes if your private commercial health insurance company continues to cover Coloradans in the area where you live. However, you would probably be paying twice. What most Coloradans do not know is that private, commercial health insurance companies make a profit by covering the healthiest part of the U.S. population, not always but on occasion, denying care, delaying care and delaying payment to providers. They have to make a profit to stay in business, they have to compete with all the other private, commercial health insurance plans and they have to satisfy their stockholders. That is what it means to be a successful business. However, you as the patient sometimes do not benefit from this health care financing method because sometime your care in the future will be denied or delayed especially if that care would be expensive limiting the health insurance company’s ability to make as much profit. A state-owned enterprise would have no motive to make a profit and therefore no motive to delay your care, deny care your physician recommends or delay paying your health care provider. Also, a state-owned enterprise plan would mean your premiums would be less than staying with a commercial plan because you would not be paying for advertising, lobbying, very high Chief Executive Officer’s compensation packages.

Canadians might wait to get a knee replaced but they never wait for care they urgently need. They never wait to get medical care when they are having a heart attack. In the U.S. you might get care in the emergency room for a heart attack but you might not get a stent if you don’t have insurance coverage or your deductible is so high you cannot afford to pay the deductible. Coloradans are also waiting longer for knee replacements because they need to wait for an operating room to be available before they can get care or wait until the orthopedic surgeon can schedule the procedure based on his or her schedule. Both Colorado and Canada have health care provider shortages that need to be solved to assure patients do not need to wait long periods of time for care.

Because someone will help pay for your surgery if you have testicular cancer

No. Socialized medicine means health care providers are employed by the government like they are in Britain. The Colorado proposal means most physicians will remain in private practice. There ae some exceptions. Currently some physicians work for Federally Qualified Community Health Centers and may choose to continue to work in that setting. The change will be that there will be only ONE payment source for the physician’s care, a Colorado enterprise owned by the people of Colorado, not a private commercial health insurance company. The Veteran’s medical care is an example of socialized medicine. The physicians who care for veterans are paid a salary by the federal government. Most, if not all, Americans would not consider the Veteran’s Medical services for our veterans to be “unamerican.”

Competition between the private commercial health insurance companies is not controlling health care costs. Competition is a free-market concept proposed by Adam Smith in 1778. Competition works to control costs for some services and products but not for health care. You can shop around for the best price to buy the car you want but you don’t have time to shop around when you have a heart attack. You can learn about all the features a new car might have and become knowledgeable about the history of reliability of a particular car, but unless you have a medical degree and specialized in cardiology you probably won’t have all the information you need to decide who is the best cardiologist for the care you will need. You have to trust your cardiologist to recommend the right procedure for you.

The Colorado plan would be designed to provide care where people live because it will be patient-centered not profit- centered. The current way of delivering health care is based on where the most money can be made which is in the urban areas where the most “customers” live.

It will not interfere however the coverage will be as good as or more comprehensive with the Colorado plan including hearing vision and dental care. There will be no incentive to delay approval for a procedure or deny payment for a medical procedure that your physician has recommended. The choice of providers you can chose from will increase. The reimbursement rates for providers will be better than traditional Medicare reimbursement rates assuring more physicians are willing to care for patients age 65 and older.

Yes, if your doctor continues to be licensed in Colorado. If your doctor retires of course you will need to find another doctor and with the Colorado Plan you will have free choice of doctors who practice in Colorado. You will not be limited to only “in-network” doctors who have an agreement with your private, commercial health insurance company like you experience now.

Yes, some people who work for private commercial health insurance companies, for health care providers and hospitals will lose their jobs because fewer people will be needed to process claims. There will be a plan to pay for training for people who want to get a new job and need additional training. They can also use unemployment benefits while they are learning skills to get a new job. When Coloradans spend less on a publicly funded plan than they would pay for a private commercial insurance plan a significant amount of money will be freed up in the economic cycle to create new businesses and employ people who have been displaced. For example, some people will be hired to be a medical assistant or a nursing home nurse assistant since there will be more demand for their care because more people will be receiving health care.

No

That is unlikely because health care economists will calculate how much health care costs in Colorado now and will adjust the premiums to cover those costs with an inflation factor built in to the cost and therefore the premium each of us pays. Also there will be a reserve fund established prior to implementing the Colorado plan to be sure there is enough money to cover expenses if an unforeseen event occurs like a pandemic.

The State plan will allow the health care enterprise to negotiate drug prices with the pharmaceutical companies. Some elected officials have suggested price transparency through government regulation will control the cost of prescription drugs. However, transparency may not matter especially in emergency situations and even in nonemergent situations shopping around for the best price isn’t helpful if your private commercial health insurance plan uses a formulary that does not include the best drug for you.

Taxpayers like you and I already pay for most pharmaceutical research through the National Institute of Health. The pharmaceutical companies do some research but much of their costs are associated with advertising, marketing and lobbying.

No, we don’t have the best health care system in the world. We have some of the best health care providers in the world but some of us can’t afford their care. All other Developed countries cover all their residents, spend, on average, half as much as we do and have better health outcomes than we do. For example, they have fewer mothers die in childbirth than we do. None of their citizens experience medical bankruptcy.

It fixed some problems but not everything we should fix. It required private commercial health insurance companies to cover people with pre-existing conditions, it gave states permission to expand Medicaid eligibility, and it requires private commercial health insurance companies to cover children up to age 25 with their parent’s or guardian’s coverage. However, it did not control the cost of health care nor did it cover everyone who lives in America. There are still many Coloradans who are un-insured or underinsured.

Yes, however the current political environment will make it unlikely a national plan will be implemented in the near future. It is more likely some States like Colorado will take the lead passing universal health care legislation. In Canada, Saskatchewan was the first province to have universal health care eventually the entire country created a national plan by going province by province. State by State is the most likely scenario for the U.S.

No. Several states are trying to get coverage for all their residents but so far, no state has provided universal health care. Advocates in New York, California, Washington, Oregon and Vermont are working on legislation to cover their residents and might offer ballot measures at the same time Colorado puts something on the Colorado ballot in 2026. Romney care requires everyone to have health insurance but is very difficult for some Massachusetts residents to pay because the cost of health insurance is higher than it needs to be in order to pay for private commercial health insurance company’s extremely high CEO compensation packages, lobbying, advertising and stockholder expenses.

We will save money because we will avoid the unnecessary administrative cost of our current way of financing health care like corporate profits and extremely high compensation packages for private health care corporations’ chief executive officers. Also, we will be able to save some money by negotiating drug prices. We can eliminate unnecessary middlemen like Pharmacy Benefit Management organizations that add to our cost of care even though they appear to be saving money. In addition, we will save money because people will be treated earlier and in more appropriate medical settings. For example, instead of a Coloradan waiting until they are in a diabetic coma and going to the hospital emergency room for care, they will get regular non-emergent care from their own doctor to manage their diabetes and prevent a diabetic coma. Also, the Colorado Health care enterprise might provide hospitals with a lump sum at the beginning of the year instead of paying for several individual claims. The hospital would need to live within a budget similar to how you live within a household budget each year. Of course, if there was an unforeseen extraordinary crisis, the hospital would request additional funding from the Enterprise to cover these unexpected expenses.

Some health care providers might move to other States to make more money, but the Colorado Plan would make sure physicians, nurse practitioners, physical therapists in private practice are reimbursed a fair rate for the services they provide. The health care providers in private practice would no longer need to pay additional staff to process claims for a multitude of private commercial health insurance companies. The estimate is that most private physician practices would save approximately $100,000 with the Colorado Plan because they would submit claims to only one payer, the Colorado enterprise, instead of several with different rules and forms to navigate. Health care providers would serve on a board for the enterprise to advocate for fair reimbursement rates. Also, many private commercial health insurance companies intentionally delay payment to health care providers to increase their profit margin. The Colorado Enterprise would be designed to promptly pay health care providers because it would be a not-for- profit business owned by the people of Colorado and not want to create cash flow problems for practicing health care providers. For all of these reasons, some health care providers will be attracted to practice in Colorado from other States and hopefully improve the current health care provider shortage. Medicare rates set by the Federal Government can be augmented by the State to assure providers are fairly reimbursed. Obviously we would not want to exacerbate the health care provider shortage but rather encourage providers to practice in Colorado because they can focus on providing good medical care not become distracted by the private commercial insurance companies interference in their ability to practice medicine by telling the doctor they can prescribe one blood pressure medicine but not another when the doctor knows the best blood pressure medicine is not on the private commercial health insurance companies list of okay drugs to prescribe.

The funds would be secure in an enterprise and could only be used to pay for Coloradan’s health care. The legislature could not borrow from the Health Care Fund to pay for a road or a bridge or anything else.

The Colorado Plan would be overseen by a board made up of health care providers and consumers who are accountable to the people of Colorado to assure administrative costs are held to a low percentage of total costs. Currently your private commercial health insurance company administrators are accountable to their board and stock holders and not to their patients or providers.

Yes, as long as your son or daughter is a Colorado resident. Your son or daughter can go to a health care provider in the State where they are attending college and the health care provider will be able to file a claim with the Colorado health care enterprise for reimbursement.

Yes, as long as your primary residence is Colorado. You can go to a health care provider in another State and the health care provider will be able to file a claim with the Colorado health care enterprise for reimbursement.

A savings account would not control the cost of health care. It would help some higher income Coloradans pay for their health care but 40% of Coloradans don’t make enough money to set aside more than $500.00 in a savings account.

Attend a town hall meeting with your state representative and senator and tell them you want them to vote for a bill to put the measure on the Colorado ballot. When the legislature passes the bill, you can campaign for and vote for the ballot measure. Or you can support a Citizens initiative or a proposition that is on the ballot if a bill is not passed by the state legislature. Also, you can speak to a group like your Rotary Club members, host a neighborhood party and show a documentary like Healing U.S., staff a health care booth at a county fair, write a letter to the editor, and/or canvass.