Senator Karen Keiser speaks out on Public Health Insurance Option Video

This Tuesday, Washington State Senator Karen Keiser (D, Des Moines), won endorsement of the hotly contested public health insurance option from the body representing every state legislature in the country. Citing the need for bold and immediate action to stem the rising costs of health care, over three quarters of the states represented on the the National Conference of State Legislatures' Standing Committee on Health voted to include an amendment co-authored by Keiser calling for a public health insurance option in the committee's official policy recommendations for federal health care reform. On Thursday, the recommendation will come up for a vote before the full body of NCSL, which represents over 7,500 state legislators across the country.

According to Keiser, who authored the amendment along with peers from Iowa, Maine, and New Hampshire, We are coming together this week to send a very clear message: the time to act on health reform is now, and states are not going to sit on the sidelines and watch. We won't settle for halfway measures and we won't stand for delay. We need a public health insurance option to keep the insurance industry honest and make sure working families and small businesses in Washington are free to choose the best health care available at a price they can afford.

The endorsement of the public option signals a growing consensus from state legislators in support of one of President Obama's key reform priorities at a time of escalating debate on Capitol Hill. Last month, a bipartisan group of over 700 state legislators from 48 states, including 42 from Washington, delivered a letter to President Obama and Congress throwing their weight behind the public option. In the month since, over 100 legislators have added their signatures to the letter.

According to Keiser, who helped circulate the letter, the growing consensus behind the public option has arisen out of acute economic necessity. Washington is facing one of the biggest budget shortfalls in its history, and spiraling health care costs are one of the the main culprits. Health care expenditures are rising at twice the rate of inflation, and employer-provided premiums are growing four times faster than wages. Lobbyists in Washington D.C. may think we need to wait, but for the average working family or small business owner in Washington, it's pretty clear that we need to act and we need to act now.

According to Nathan Newman, Executive Director of Progressive States Network, a national organization that supports the public option and drafted and circulated the letter signed by 800 legislators in support of it, Keiser has been instrumental in building an unprecedented national coalition. For too long states have gone it alone on health care reform while Washington failed to act. Senator Keiser and her colleagues across the country have made it clear that they're ready to stand up together and demand more.

In addition to the public option, the amendment also recommended a series of policy proposals from the PSN letter Keiser helped circulate, including robust cost containment programs, assistance in expanding Medicaid programs, and freedom for states to set benefit requirements and other regulatory standards that exceed federal minimums.

To see a full draft of the Standing committee on Health's Policy recommendations see: http://progressivestates.org/ncsl09/healthpolicyrecommendations.pdf. To see the letter from Progressive States Network, see http://progressivestates.org/statefedhealth.