Obama's health care reform team is collecting data from health care meetings
31 12 08 - 12:45
Transition hosts health care meetings
By CHRIS FRATES - Politico
President-elect Barack Obama’s transition team is starting to collect political intelligence it could use to sway lawmakers and special interest groups in the upcoming health care reform debate.
With more than 8,500 health care meetings scheduled across the country, the transition is collecting insights into the major concerns nagging Americans and hints on how to successfully frame the debate and on the broad results they expect.
When signing up to lead the meetings, the hosts are required to enter their zip codes and phone numbers. It’s a technique honed during Obama’s presidential campaign that provides information that the new administration could use to rally constituents in a key congressional district or share voters’ concerns directly with their lawmakers.
On Tuesday, Obama’s pick to lead the health and human services department – former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota – attended his second town hall meeting in as many days. He met with seniors at a wellness center in Southeast Washington, an inner city neighborhood about five miles from the Capitol. On Monday, he had attended a community meeting in a small town east of Indianapolis.
With similar meetings planned across the country, the transition team could have a geographical and demographically diverse arsenal of data to pull from.
It already has received feedback from about 675 community meetings and is planning to put together a report for Obama and the new Congress in an attempt to set the terms of the debate and increase pressure on lawmakers to act.
“We think that having grassroots involvement all over the country will ultimately lead to members of Congress taking note. It will lead to governors taking note. And ultimately, as elected officials all over the country see their constituents express their concerns like we saw today, it’s going to lead to a greater degree of commitment on the part of elected people and the leadership itself,” said Daschle, who will also oversee the new White House Office of Health Reform.
The town meeting guide provided by the transition to the moderators asks multiple-choice and open-ended questions, ranging from what are the biggest problems facing health care to what can be done to help those who have trouble paying medical bills.
And unlike President Bill Clinton’s run at health care reform in the early ‘90s, which was criticized for being developed in secret, Obama’s team is making a point of starting outside official Washington. The idea is to develop a sense of buy in from the public.
That sense of empowerment was evident among the seniors gathered Tuesday, with many suggesting that personal responsibility is the key to health care. But they ticked off the shortfalls of the current system and solutions for making it easier to access quality care.
Kermit Boulware said he was concerned about the lack of a safety net for the unemployed who are too affluent or young to qualify for government programs, but can’t afford to buy insurance on their own.
Eugene Kinlow talked about the “meanness of the means testing” to qualify for Medicaid, saying that seniors with modest savings are forced to become poor before they qualify for the program.
The wide-ranging discussion touched on hospital waiting times, the cost of drugs, long term care and the lack of quality and dignity in health care delivery.
A number of the participants said they believed Daschle heard their concerns and would take them under advisement. They said hoped this was just the first of many discussions to come.
Mildred Lockridge called the session “fantastic,” but warned “if it’s a dog and pony show, they’re going to hear from me. We’ve had too many dog and pony shows.”