Published: August 27, 2009 05:43 pm      

Casey tries to ease health-care worries

David Wylie of Westmont wanted to hear how Sen. Bob Casey Jr. expects the nation to pay for health-care reform.

Herb Ewald of Johnstown wanted to know whether Casey would put himself into a publicly supported health insurance plan.

But unlike other town hall meetings on health-care reform, opponents such as Ewald and Wylie remained cordial Thursday and allowed the event at Pitt-Johnstown’s Living/Learning Center to proceed.

“We had a great crowd – both in size and civility,” Casey said after the meeting. “It shows people can get into a room who have a vigorous fulcrum of debate. They can discuss the issue and not get mad at each other.”

For his part, Ewald was not convinced.

“I think it is really going to be bad,” Ewald said outside the conference center.

“We are in for a world of hurt.”



Ewald worries about government control and paying more to support those who won’t work.

Wylie is concerned about hidden costs.

“I heard half of the trillion dollars is going to come from the rich people,” Wylie said. “They won’t really pay it. They will just pass it on to the people who buy their products.”

While neither man’s question was drawn during the public forum, Casey addressed both issues.

He defended plans that would increase taxes on those making more than $250,000 a year.

“If you are a very wealthy American, you got tax cuts in the last eight years,” Casey said. “You did pretty well. Here’s the problem: The premise of the tax cuts was to incentivize people to spend more and the economy would take off.

“Well, we are in the ditch now. So the tax cuts for wealthy people, in my opinion, haven’t worked very well.”

Health-care reform is vital to economic recovery, Casey added, referring to statistics that show unchecked health-care costs will drive up the nationakl debt and overwhelm more families’ finances.

Ewald’s question about Congress putting itself into the public plan reflects proposals by two Louisiana Republicans. Sen. David Vitter and Rep. John Fleming introduced resolutions asking members of Congress who support a public option to enroll themselves.

The opponents fear private insurers would not be able to compete with a public plan, leading to federal takeover of health care, restricting choice and reducing quality.

Casey admits it is unlikely he would choose the public option because he has a good plan. The Senate bill Casey is promoting would not require anyone to enroll in the public plan. It is just another option, he said.

“All Americans should have the same kind of meaningful choices that senators have,” Casey said, reading from the bill.

“The public option is 100 percent voluntary,” he explained. “You never have to join the public option if you don’t want to. ... We are trying to create a marketplace so that people can choose their own insurance.”

But the public option should help reduce costs by bringing more people into coverage, improving health and spreading the risk, Casey said, comparing the option to Medicare, Medicaid and federally financed insurance for military and federal employees.

Before the question-and-answer session, three women shared their thoughts on the health-care situation.

Pitt-Johnstown Nursing Director Janet Grady pushed for attention to access, quality and cost. Her comments were interrupted by the only outburst of the program, when a man demanded the program move ahead to a public forum. Ushers and other audience members quickly ended the interruption.

Holding her infant daughter, Cora, Trisha Urban of Hamburg tearfully recounted how she found her husband dead at their home after she went into labor in February.

The couple lost their insurance when he went back to college and were denied coverage because of pre-existing conditions. She was pregnant and he had a heart condition.

A month before his death, her husband skipped a doctor’s appointment because of the mounting expenses.

“He was in the same hospital as me,” Urban said. “He was in the morgue; I was in maternity giving birth. ... The current system has failed us.”