The Supreme Court’s decision on the Affordable Care Act removes some uncertainty and allows those of us in the health care industry to continue making progress in expanding health insurance coverage, improving care delivery and adopting insurance reform.
Kaiser Permanente has a long history of supporting affordable access to high-quality health care. From our earliest days providing health care to workers in the Kaiser shipyards of World War II to our current programs that provide subsidized coverage to those in economic distress, care-and-coverage-for-all has been central to our mission.
As an integrated system serving more than 9 million members, Kaiser Permanente has been a supporter of national health care reform as an important step in fixing a system that has long rewarded the provision of more care instead of better care.
As important as this ruling is, work remains to be done to expand access to coverage and to care, to connect financial incentives to high-quality care and to control the cost of care.
Opportunities to reform how care is provided in our nation are waiting. More than 75 percent of health care costs in the United States come from services provided to people with chronic conditions — with 10 percent of all patients needing 80 percent of our total care resources — and America gets care right for patients with chronic conditions barely 50 percent of the time. The lack of coordination prevalent in the American health care system results in poorer health and higher costs.
In Colorado, hard work supported by policy makers, business leaders, citizens and the health care industry has positioned this state well for establishing a health insurance exchange that will make it possible for more individuals and small-business owners to buy health insurance in a new marketplace.
Kaiser Permanente believes it is time for the country to focus on what we can do to improve health. This starts with care that is coordinated by teams, supported by information technology and built on a culture of health in the United States.
Donna Lynne is president of Kaiser Permanente Colorado.
