U.S. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., believes repealing and having an immediate replacement of the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, would be good for Kentucky.
“Obamacare is on a downward spiral. I think we have a lot of the same concerns,” Paul said. “There are problems with rising costs. We’ve got to figure out a way to balance that.”
Paul, who spoke to doctors and medical professionals Monday at TriStar Greenview Regional Hospital, said he has heard a lot of complaints about the ACA but acknowledges that there wasn’t a perfect system before it, either.
“We want to get rid of it and have a perfect system before Obamacare is repealed,” he said.
Paul wants people to be able to choose what type of insurance they want.
“It would be equalized to see if they could get affordability,” he said. “I’d rather see it go from a bottom-up quality. It’s a lot of paperwork. I’m not as excited about a mandatory top down.”
Paul’s proposal would allow a tax credit of up to $5,000 per taxpayer for contributions to a Health Savings Account.
This would remove the limit on maximum allowable contributions and allow anyone with any type of insurance to start a health savings account.
People with a high deductible plan can start an account now, but Paul’s plan would allow anyone to pay things such as health prevention services and copays from the HSA.
“Your HSA can be for things such as the gym or nutrition,” he said.
Perfectly healthy people could choose only catastrophic insurance in Paul’s proposed plan to help lower the price of insurance.
Right now everyone is required to have health insurance or pay a tax penalty. Paul said he wants to see health insurance given to a child just as life insurance is.
“We have high prices,” he said. “We have to figure out how to lower them.”
Medicaid is costing states money for those who don’t need to be on it, Paul said.
“We have to realize the cost to that,” he said.
Large groups could get together to buy health insurance, thus driving down costs, Paul said.
“Group association insurance works,” he said.
Paul said more medical practices are becoming affiliated with hospitals and the marketplace will continue to see those affiliations increase.
“Most people don’t want to handle paperwork,” he said of individual practitioners.
Right now there’s not a real marketplace where the prices aren’t fixed, Paul said.
“There is no flexibility,” he said. “No Democrat will vote for a repeal.”
Many of the doctors and medical personnel left shortly after the speech so they were unavailable for comment.
TriStar Chief Executive Officer Mike Sherrod called Paul a senator “who makes practical decisions.”
“He’s one of the leading advocates of liberty,” he said. “He came to solve problems and provided practical solutions whether in Bowling Green or in Washington.”
Sherrod believes the town hall meeting went well.
“I think there are so many different things that we don’t know about,” he said. “We don’t know what will happen. I think it’s a good discussion to have.”
