John McCain
Town Hall
Las Cruces, NM 08/20/08
TRANSCRIPT:
AUDIENCE MEMBER: [...] My husband was the former mayor of El Paso. [...] My husband was diagnosed with a brain disorder, the same one that afflicted Sen. Domenici. And at 51, he did not have long-term care. And it was so devastating that totally destroyed our finances, so I had to take him to my family's country home, which is in Spain. I got to see first-hand how social care was so much affordable. He was a fighter--although he undermined his muscle, he lost his voice, I was able to provide better care for him in another country than in our own. And so, I wanna know about your health care plan [starts to cry]-- how can be affordable? How can we change that? Why did I have to take him someplace else so he could die in a better place than his own country?
[applause]
JOHN MCCAIN: Thank you and please accept the sympathy of all of us. [...] There is a health care crisis in America. [...] We have to reform health care in America. And we have to make insurance available and affordable for all Americans. I do not believe that that means a government-run health care system is the most efficient for what we need. [applause] And we need to have policies that encourage home health care as opposed to institutionalized care. And we need to treat people on an outcome basis, that don't pay for every test or every procedure, every visit to the doctor; but treat them for a period of time and then pay that provider. [...] There's a program now [...] that's not as wide as I'd like to see where it's called cash-in counseling, and seniors are given money every month and then they're able to decide how they want to pay for their own health care. It's remarkable the savings that have been realized.
MCCAIN: But in cases like your husband, where they're basically uninsurables, quote "uninsurables"--people with chronic diseases such as the terrible affliction that befell your husband--[...] we should have [...] Government Approved Plans, so that we pool federal and state money together and establish wide risk pools so that there is affordable and available health insurance for people like you and your husband. We cannot leave the quote "uninsurables," or chronic-disease victims, without the access to care. And so it's gonna have to be a federal and state combination, providing significant federal money from the federal government. And we are going to have to have that as a major part of health care reform. Because we cannot allow any American, any American citizen to experience what your husband experienced.
LABEL: JM NM 08-20 (EW#15) CRKD - ClipA
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