For Immediate Release
October 17, 2007
Contact: Joe Sterns
717-787-5708
(Cell) 717-497-0806
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Folmer Counters RendellCare with "Healthy Pennsylvania"

HARRISBURG – (Oct. 17, 2007) – State Sen. Mike "Citizen Mike" Folmer (R-Lebanon) today introduced Healthy Pennsylvania as a consumer-driven alternative to Gov. Rendell's "Prescription for Pennsylvania."

"We must lower the cost of health care while enhancing its quality and accessibility," Folmer said. "Government fiat has been tried in Canada and Europe with disastrous results, so let us instead go down the proven road of empowering consumers with choice and personal autonomy."

The elements of Healthy Pennsylvania include: 

• Sunsetting state health insurance mandates.

• Promoting Health Savings Accounts (HSAs).

• Weeding out bad health care professionals.

• Giving health care consumers more price information.

• Establish tax deductions and credits for those who pay for their own health care.

• Increasing competition among health insurers.

• Establishing a high-risk pool similar to the auto insurance market.

• Promoting emergency room diversion programs and other cost containment procedures used in states such as Florida.

• Phasing out MCARE.

Folmer noted that other reforms introduced by his Senate colleagues – such as tort reform and allowing small employers to pool together to purchase health insurance – are also integral in lowering cost and improving quality and accessibility. "There is no magic bullet," Folmer said. "We need a comprehensive solution with several elements which are inseparable."

For more information, log on to http://senaterepublicannews.com/healthypa/healthy-pa.htm.