Health Group Report Seeks to Set Basic Benefits Level

A coalition of 172 health and other organizations released a comprehensive report Monday aimed at establishing a basic health care benefits package to serve as a “benchmark” for consumers and government.

In a three-volume report summing up five years’ work, the Health Policy Agenda for the American People made 195 policy recommendations for the private and public sectors covering nearly all major areas of health care.

Diane McCarthy, chairman of the coalition’s implementation committee, said the report “marks a significant step toward closing a critical gap in our nation’s health care policy.”

McCarthy said the goal of the recommendations is to assure that “no American is denied access to quality medical care because of his or her inability to pay.”

A key recommendation is a call for the “development of a basic health care benefits package which will serve as a benchmark for consumers in evaluating insurance coverage and will permit government policy makers to assess the adequacy of public sector programs.”

Minimum Acceptable Level

The report said that the basic benefits package would identify a minimum level of acceptable health care benefits that should be available to all Americans, focusing on such services as diagnosis of illness and injury, coverage for catastrophic and long-term illness and annual checkups for children.

The report calls also for restructuring Medicaid, the government’s health program for the poor, including establishment of national rather than state standards for uniform eligibility, benefits and payment mechanisms across state lines.

It calls for extending the program to include the 14 million “medically indigent” Americans considered ineligible for Medicaid because they do not meet program requirements.

Other major recommendations include:

--An annual 10% increase in federal financing for basic and applied biomedical research for the remainder of the decade.

--Programs to collect and publish information that will permit consumers to compare the cost and type of services provided by competing health care providers.

Officers of the coalition include insurers, health professionals, consumer and business groups, along with the federal Defense and Health and Human Services departments.