A mock health care hearing was held at the State capitol building on Feb. 13 with college students performing the roles of Democrat and Republican congressmen. Sixteen Austin Community College and University of Texas students volunteered to participate, eight coming from each school. They each had a chance to directly question professional opinions about the infrastructure and politics of our health care system. Testimonies were heard from professionals on the issues of primary care expansion, patient safety, and the uninsured and underinsured.
Orchestrated by ACC's Center for Public Policy & Political Studies (CPPPS) and the Center for Student Political Studies (CSPS) club, the event was unscripted and open to the public.
The event gave participants a unique chance to understand the process of creating policy from the genuine chairs of elected officials. Students maintained a partisan character and had the opportunity to debate nurses, lawyers, and other health care affiliates on the current issues of our nations health care system.
Opening statements from the uninsured/underinsured panel began with Rusty Rice, president of the Texas Association of Health Underwriters, decrying the need for public education on the importance of having health insurance. He explained that premiums increase when uninsured, yet financially eligible people use emergency rooms for primary care, forcing hospitals to raise costs to cover losses.
"Somebody has to pay for that somewhere... and that's typically passed along to people who do have health insurance in the form of premiums," Rice said.
Attorney Jim Bryce suggested that Rice had inadvertently made the case for universal health care.
"If we get everybody into it, we'll reduce the costs by the most," Bryce said.
ACC student Paul Theobold, acting as a liberal Democrat, suggested capping wages on the CEO's in the health care industry to Mr. Rice.
"I would absolutely not support that," Rice said.
He describes wage caps and a federal takeover of health care as "…driving out the free market."
On the patient safety panel, a Brown McCarroll attorney, Bill Hopkins spoke about medical errors reinforcing a costly health care system.
"I've had the dubious pleasure of both prosecuting nurses and defending them," Hopkins said.
He underscored the $17 – $29 billion spent a year to correct medical errors.
"If we could solve those alone, you could see the money savings that could be reallocated towards half the problems we talked about this morning," said Hopkins.
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