    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1993, Book II)]
    [September 25, 1993]
    [Pages 1596-1598]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    The President's Radio Address
    September 25, 1993

        Good morning. Last Wednesday evening, I asked Congress to take up
    the challenge of providing health security to every American, to help
    write the next great chapter in our Nation's history. Already your
    response has been positive and dramatic, creating what I believe will be
    an irresistible momentum for reform, while insisting that we be careful
    to do it right. And I am increasingly confident that before it adjourns
    next year, Congress will pass and I will sign a bill that guarantees
    each American comprehensive health benefits that can never ever be taken
    away.
        In the debate between now and that day, a debate I welcome, our most
    urgent priority must be to ensure that we preserve what is right with
    American health care and fix what is wrong. So today I want to take a
    few minutes to talk with you about the plan that I am suggesting and how
    it will work for you, what will stay the same and what will change.
        First, I want you to know that after considering all the options and
    looking at the systems in place in other countries in the world, I
    decided that our Nation does not need a Government-run health care
    system. So our plan builds upon the private system, which provides
    health care to the vast majority of you today. Nine of 10 of you who
    have private health care coverage now, get it through the place you
    work. In the future, you will do it just like you do now. Because that's
    what works now, I think it should work for everyone.
        Second, under our health care plan, 63 percent, more than 6 in 10
    Americans who have health insurance today, will pay the same or less
    than you do today for benefits that are the same or greater, including
    the right to choose your doctor. If you get good health care, if you
    like your benefits, if your employer pays 100 percent of your health
    care costs, nothing will change.
        Let's say you work for Super Software, a small computer company that
    employs about 150 people, and that today your company provides you
    excellent health benefits, your choice of doctors, and picks up the
    whole tab. That won't change. You will still sign up for a health plan
    at work, see the doctors you want, and get the same benefits.
        Now, suppose you work for a giant auto company and your union has
    fought hard for your benefits; you've even had to give up a wage
    increase or two to get them. Well, under this

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    new plan, you will keep those benefits.
        What do you get out of this plan? You get security. You get the
    knowledge that you'll never lose health coverage even if you lose or
    change your job or you get very, very sick. You also know that no matter
    what happens, there's a limit to what your employer can do to reduce the
    benefits or your choice of plans.
        I know that many people also want to know whether you'll still be
    able to choose your doctor. Again, I say the answer is yes. And no
    matter what kind of plan you're in today, you will all benefit because
    under this new system, the cost of health care will go up much more
    slowly than they've been going up for the last 10 or 12 years. And
    you'll be able to choose from at least three plans providing
    comprehensive coverage. You'll also be able to choose your doctor no
    matter what plan you decide to join because you can follow your doctor
    into whatever plan he or she joins.
        Now, a lot of families have more than one doctor. Say you're a
    working mother who values your obstetrician, and you trust your
    children's pediatrician. You want to know if you can see them both.
    There's still no need to worry, because doctors will be able to join
    more than one plan and keep treating the same patients they see today.
        Finally, we're going to maintain the quality of American health
    care. We can do that by making sure that there are quality standards met
    by all the health care plans, by spending our money smarter, less on
    paperwork and unnecessary costs and more on medical research, health
    care centers, and preventive care; by freeing your doctors and nurses
    from the paperwork they've got to wade through everyday; and by giving
    you information, valuable information, on variations in costs and
    outcomes in medical procedures in your area. These are the things that
    are right, that make sense, that will keep the quality that we've got
    today.
        Now, let's talk about what needs to be changed in this huge health
    care system of ours. We begin with the need for security. No American
    can be absolutely guaranteed today that he or she will never lose health
    care. But we begin by making that guarantee, a comprehensive package of
    health care benefits, the kinds of benefits that only people with the
    best plans and the best companies get today, that never can be taken
    away, even if you lose your job or move to another town or State or
    someone in your family gets very sick.
        Then we're going to do something, frankly, that we should have done
    a long time ago. We're going to provide every American, no matter what
    kind of plan you sign up for, with free preventive care. Things like
    immunizations for children, prenatal care for pregnant women,
    mammograms, cholesterol screenings, things that will keep us healthy and
    save us all a lot of money over the long run.
        Many Americans will actually have more choices in the kinds of
    health care they get because everyone will have a choice of at least
    three health care plans in connection with their job. Today, only about
    a third of Americans have a choice of more than one plan when they're
    insured at work. That's a lot more than most Americans have.
        We're also going to clear out the paper and the fine print. No more
    fighting with some insurance bureaucrat hundreds of miles away in order
    to get what your policy owes you anyway. And no more doctors telling
    stories of the hundreds of patients they could have served every year if
    only they weren't swamped in redtape.
        This will simplify our system and literally save tens of billions of
    dollars a year. Don't take my word for it, ask any doctor or nurse or
    hospital administrator about the growth of unnecessary paperwork in the
    last decade, mandated by both Government and insurance companies. It
    adds about a dime to every single dollar we spend in health care. And it
    has resulted in hospitals hiring 4 times as many clerical workers as
    doctors being added to their staffs.
        Something else is going to be different, too. We're going to ask
    each of you to take more responsibility. Six of every 10 of you will pay
    the same or less than you do now for the same or better benefits. But
    some people will pay more: people who are getting a free ride today,
    businesses that contribute nothing to cover their employees, and others
    who offer bare bones coverage with huge deductibles and copayments, and
    those employees will have to pay something for their health care. Young,
    single adults will pay more, too, especially those who are in the best
    of health and don't see any reason to buy health insurance, the ones
    who, when they end up in the emergency room without insurance, pass
    those costs on to the rest of us.
        For small businesses and people on very low wages, there will be
    discounts to make sure we

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    don't cost jobs or hurt people, but everybody should take some
    responsibility for their own health care. It's not fair to the rest of
    Americans when you don't. There will also be more responsibility on
    those in the systems, less for insurance regulation and overhead, a
    crackdown on fraud and abuse, fewer frivolous malpractice lawsuits,
    fewer unnecessary procedures done just to get the money and more
    responsibility for individuals for their own health, strong efforts and
    incentives to reduce teen pregnancy and low birthweight babies, to
    reduce the rate of AIDS. These are the kinds of things we have got to
    do.
        But in the end, the most important thing that will change is this:
    Every American will get something that today no amount of money can buy,
    the security of health care that can never be taken away no matter what.
    No matter how good your coverage is today, you can lose it. You can lose
    it all at once, or it can be gradually taken away year after year.
        Our goal then is health care security for all Americans. The only
    way to get there is to keep what's right with our system, the best
    medical care in the world, the best medical technology, the best medical
    professionals, and fix what's wrong.
        We're going to protect quality and choice, but we're going to make
    some changes. We're going to simplify this system. We're going to get
    billions of dollars of savings. We're going to ask people who don't pay
    anything now to assume more responsibility for their own health care.
    That way we can give you health care security without a big tax
    increase.
        In the weeks ahead, we'll be describing in greater details what
    needs to be done. But the most important thing is health security. We
    can do it.
        Thanks for listening.

    Note: The address was recorded at 5:21 p.m. on September 24 in the
    Roosevelt Room at the White House for broadcast at 10:06 a.m. on
    September 25.