Gov. Walz Talks Healthcare Reform in Duluth
Roundtable held at Snooty Fox Tea Shop.
DULUTH, Minn.- Over a month after releasing a new budget proposal, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz shared more about a feature of that proposal, his OneCare health care reform.
At a roundtable discussion at Snooty Fox Tea Shop, the governor promised to “cut out the middleman” by not paying insurance companies hoping they lower costs.
Instead he plans to provide direct subsidies to individuals and create a new public healthcare plan with buy–ins.
“The entire debate down in St. Paul is: let the Provider Tax and the Health Care Access Fund go broke, we’ll deal with the 1.1 billion people who lose insurance after that,” Walz said. “And we want to do reinsurance, we don’t want to have any checks and balances on the insurance companies, we just want you to move hundreds of billions of dollars to them.”
Not everyone approves of the governor’s plan to use the Provider Tax to fund things like opioid prevention.
Minnesota House Minority leader Kurt Duadt released a statement which reads in part:
“Governor Walz is on the road today to promote a plan to raise health care costs on Minnesotans by over $1 billion dollars. Families already pay too much for health care, and everyone knows you don’t lower health care costs by raising the cost of health care.”
“If Governor Walz and House Democrats are serious about lowering health care costs, let’s start by taking health care tax increases off the table.”
Still the governor argues that people across the state calling for change make that necessary.
“I would encourage my friends who disagree with what I’m talking about to go have a gathering in a coffee shop and see how many people tell you: ‘what I really don’t want is insurance,’ ‘what I really don’t want you to do is anything to contain the cost,’ and ‘what I really enjoy doing is worrying about this for my family.’ Go find those people,” he said.
“Minnesotans want something better, we can do better.”
Minnesotans present at the roundtable did want something better.
According to those who work directly with the uninsured and underinsured, Minnesotans everywhere are tired of rising premium costs.
“We see thousands of people every year for enrollments, and are seeing people struggle to afford the cost of their insurance, as well as what it takes to get care,” said Megan Halena, Program Director at Generations Healthcare Initiatives in Duluth.
“So maybe you could afford your premium, but your deductible is so high that you can’t ever use it.”
Still, not everyone approves of the governor’s plan to use the provider tax to fund things like opioid prevention.
House Minority leader Kurt Duadt released a statement which reads in part:
“Governor Walz is on the road today to promote a plan to raise health care costs on Minnesotans by over $1 billion dollars. Families already pay too much for health care, and everyone knows you don’t lower health care costs by raising the cost of health care.”
“If Governor Walz and House Democrats are serious about lowering health care costs, let’s start by taking health care tax increases off the table.”
The governor said the plan is still in the works, which is why these sessions are valuable so he can get input from Minnesotans directly affected.
Later in the day he held another in Rochester.
