Congress goes beyond hill for health care Rx.(Practice Trends)

WASHINGTON -- Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) says that the answer to America's health care problem does not lie with Congress--at least, not initially.

"I spent 2 years studying what went wrong in the Clinton debacle," he said at a meeting sponsored by America's Health Insurance Plans. Sen. Wyden was referring to President Bill Clinton's unsuccessful health care reform effort in the 1990s. He also looked at a similar effort in the 1940s by President Harry S Truman.

His conclusion: "There is a remarkable parallel in 60 years of failure .... For 6 decades, the effort has involved trying to write a piece of federal legislation in Washington, D.C. [But] the special interests would attack the legislation and each other, and everything would fail."

Instead, "I decided to go 180 degrees the other way," he said. "We'll start it outside [Washington]."

In March, Sen. Wyden, along with Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) and Comptroller General David Walker, announced the formation of the Citizens' Working Group on Health Care. The group is composed of 14 people from across the country, including physicians, health advocates, hospital administrators, academicians, nurses, and a union representative. Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt will serve as the 15th member.

The group is one result of a new law known as the Health Care That Works for All Americans Act, which was cosponsored by the two senators. One thing the group will do, according to Sen. Wyden, is "tell people where the $1.8 trillion spent on health care actually goes .... I think people will be pretty surprised." The information will be made available online as well as in booklets and in libraries.

The group also will hold public hearings to get input on what should be done to reform the system. "No one has walked the public through the choices and tradeoffs that come with a health care system that works for everybody," he said. "We're now going to have a real debate about how we create a system that works for everybody."