Texas Leads The Nation In Uninsured People

* Texas has highest percentage of uninsured at 25.1% of its population [5.6 million people].
* Seventy-nine percent of uninsured Texans work or have a working family member.
* Between 76 percent and 82 percent of the uninsured in Texas are U.S. citizens.
* Sixty-eight percent of nonpoor uninsured Texans are white, non-Hispanic individuals.
* Some 2,500 uninsured Texans die prematurely each year.
* One million uninsured Texans do not receive adequate care for chronic diseases.

The figures above were taken from the Fort Worth Star-Telegram and they don't paint a very pretty picture of Texas. To put it bluntly, Texas ranks LAST in healthcare coverage among the 50 states. This is not only ridiculous, but it's created a huge burden on our existing healthcare network, especially emergency rooms.

Last week, University of Texas System Regents met in Dallas to discuss the healthcare problem and possible solutions. Dr. Kenneth Shine, UT System's executive vice chancellor for health affairs, said, "Simply throwing more money at the problem is not going to solve it. We have to change the way we provide care."

On Friday, they released their recommendations. They believe Texas should add more community-based outpatient centers to relieve the burden on overcrowded emergency rooms. They say this would also reduce the cost of caring for non-emergency patients.

They also want the state to provide more wellness care. They said it is cheaper to keep a patient healthy, than to treat him/her once they are sick. But our current system pays doctors for procedures to treat the sick, not for care to keep them well.

They recommend imposing a 3% quality-assurance fee on all hospitals and free-standing surgery centers, to pay for this additional healthcare. Currently, 35 other states are levying these kind of fees.

I don't doubt that these recommendations would be an improvement to our current abysmal system of healthcare, but I still have the feeling that this would be like putting a bandaid on a gunshot wound. It simply doesn't go far enough.

Why don't we bite the bullet and create a single-payer universal healthcare system that would cover all our citizens with healthcare insurance. We could pay for this coverage by:

* Levy the 3% fee on all hospitals and surgery centers, but also extend to fee to doctors visits and other healthcare procedures.

* Put a 3% fee on all worker's salaries. The current medicare tax could be eliminated, since everyone would be covered under the new system.

* Lower capital gains taxes to 3-5% and put all the funds raised into healthcare.

* Charge all businesses a 3-5% healthcare fee. This would not only bring in funds from businesses not currently offering healthcare insurance, but it would lower healthcare costs for the businesses that currently offer coverage for their employees.

I believe this would provide the funds neccessary to cover all citizens with healthcare insurance. Maybe there's a better way to fund it -- that could be debated. But however we pay for it, we must institute universal healthcare coverage here. It is long overdue.