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HHS Secretary Sebelius visits UM

Takes part in panel on health care reform

The Maine Campus | The Maine Campus

By William P. Davis

Posted on Sept. 03, 2009, at 11:45 p.m.

The Maine Campus | The Maine Campus

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius visited the University of Maine on Thursday to take part in a discussion on health care reform.

The forum, hosted by Service Employees International Union’s Change that Works campaign, consisted of a number of preselected panelists who told Sebelius of their experiences with the current health care system. The event was invitation-only.

After being introduced, Sebelius announced an $8.5 million grant awarded to Maine to expand health insurance. The money will be put toward expanding care for direct-care, seasonal and part-time workers.

“Those dollars will be used to fill an important gap for people who are hard at work but don’t, right now, have access to affordable health coverage,” Sebelius said.

Panel member Joseph McSwain of Edgecomb operates Mid-Maine Restoration, a company that specializes in tower and steeple work, with his wife. McSwain said he initially offered his employees the “Cadillac” of health care plans, and his company covered 100 percent of the cost. The company’s health care costs have risen 15 to 20 percent since the inception of the plan, and the company has had to scale the health insurance coverage down to continue to afford it. “At present we are all the way down to a catastrophic plan with astronomic deductibles and no drug coverages at all,” McSwain said. “This plan is useless to our employees. They will lose their houses before meeting the deductible.”

Other speakers included a woman who had cervical cancer in her youth and now lives her life based on whether or not she will retain her health insurance; a urologist who treated a patient who couldn’t afford the proper medication he needed and ended up getting injured because he was taking inferior medicine; and a musical instrument maker whose friend was sent home from the hospital because of “heartburn” and died the next day from his heart attack.

Speaking to reporters after the panel, Sebelius said the proposed bills are intended to provide competition, not take over health insurance. “In my home state of Kansas, one insurance company controls two-thirds of the state,” Sebelius said. “There’s no competition to hold them back.” She said nobody will be forced into a public option if they like their private health insurance and that the bills are aimed at citizens who either don’t have insurance at all or can’t afford comprehensive insurance.

Sebelius was greeted by a friendly crowd holding signs with slogans such as “Insurance companies ration health care” and “Healthcare reform NOW!” There were no visible opponents of health care reform.

Ben Goodman, statewide president of College Democrats and a UMaine student, waited outside Buchanan Alumni Hall to greet Sebelius. “We stand firmly behind the President’s agenda and his core principals,” Goodman said of his organization’s support of health care reform. On supporting a public option, a portion of the bill many Democrats view as essential but that President Barack Obama has been distancing himself from, Goodman said: “It’s something we need to discuss as a statewide organization. I support a public option, and a good majority [of College Democrats] support a public option. We’ll all be happiest if a strong provision is in the bill.”

“We need a universal health care plan; we need a single-payer system,” said Penny Char, a Maine resident and a physician who also waited outside to greet Sebelius. “We need a no frills system. If you want frills, you can buy them.”

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Mary Emmi contributed to this report.