HEALTH CARE REFORM

"Growing Health-reform Challenge For Next President" is the title of an article on yahoonews.

The author, Kevin Freking, discusses primarily the challenges of cost and coverage reform rather than the credit crunch in the financial markets. He aptly notes that there is a long history of failed health reforms and that the job has only gotten tougher with the financial meltdown.

Financial services companies, such as Sun Capital HealthCare, which provides debt-free funding resources to healthcare providers and suppliers, can only do so much for the industry. While cash-flow problems stemming from reimbursement delays from third party payors and the government can be mitigated by Sun's "cash flow solution to working capital needs, the underlying problems of the industry remain: a poor allocation of healthcare resources, a lack of emphasis on prevention, an aging and more obese population which will lead to greater need for healthcare resources, growing malpractice insurance premiums driving doctors away from practice, etc.

If we believe that a healthy populace is a desired goal of this country, both from the point of view of consumers of the goods and services that this nation produces and as users of healthcare services, then the whole delivery system of healthcare needs to be re-engineered, including pharmaceutical discovery and manufacturers, medical device development, and providing of medical treatment. A holistic approach needs to be incorporated, using modern management techniques, so that the national investment in healthcare is productive.