Town Hall Debate - Health Care: Should health care be tre...

Question: Senator, selling health care coverage in America as a

marketable commodity has become a very profitable industry. Do you

believe health care should be treated as a commodity?

SEN. OBAMA: Well, you know, as I travel around the country, this

is one of the single most frequently asked issues that I get, is the

issue of health care.

It is breaking family budgets. I can't tell you how many people I

meet who don't have health insurance. If you've got health insurance,

most of you have seen your premiums double over the last eight years.

and your copayments and deductibles have gone up 30 percent just in

the last year alone. And if you're a small business, it's a crushing

burden.

So one of the things that I have said from the start of this

campaign is that we have a moral commitment as well as an economic

imperative to do something about the health care crisis that so many

families are facing. So here is what I would do.

If you've got health care already, and probably the majority of

you do, then you can keep your plan if you are satisfied with it. You

can keep your choice of doctor. We're going to work with your

employer to lower the cost of your premiums by up to $2,500 a year.

And we're going to do it by investing in prevention. We're going to

do it by making sure that we use information technology so that

medical records are actually on computers instead of you filling forms

out in triplicate when you go to the hospital. That will reduce

medical errors and reduce costs.

If you don't have health insurance, you're going to be able to

buy the same kind of insurance