Romney on healthcare: end 'free rides'

Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney said states should put an end to "free rides" when it comes to healthcare.

At the Florida Medical Association annual conference Aug. 24 in Hollywood, Fla., the former Massachusetts governor said healthcare in America could be reformed, not through more extensive federal government involvement, but through innovative solutions formulated by states for their own unique populations.

"A one-size-fits-all national healthcare system is bound to fail," Romney said. "It ignores the very dramatic differences between states, and it relies on a Washington bureaucracy to manage."

He went on to say that healthcare should not just be of concern to Democrats.

"It's a Republican issue. It's a conservative issue. Conservative principles have the answer for healthcare," he said. "There are changes needed in our health insurance world that will make a world of difference for the people of our country."

Romney, who helped to reform Massachusetts healthcare said the first step is to analyze the population that is without health insurance. Some have legitimate reasons and some are doing it because they know that they can receive free emergency care in hospitals, paid for by the taxpayer, Romney said.

In Massachusetts, it was discovered that some could afford healthcare insurance, but weren't buying it. Some couldn't afford it . And some qualified for Medicaid but weren't signed up.

"So as we looked at our population, we realized we were going to have to follow different approaches for the different types of people that didn't have insurance," Romney said. "It cost less money to get people insured than it was costing us to hand out free care."

Romney's healthcare platform includes:

• Lowering healthcare costs
• Insuring everyone
• Easing the worry Americans have about losing insurance
• Reducing the growth rate of healthcare spending

To accomplish his goals, Romney proposes:

• Establishing federal incentives to deregulate and reform state health insurance markets
• Redirecting federal spending on free care to help low income people purchase insurance
• Instituting enhancements for health savings accounts
• Giving full deductibility of all qualified medical expenses
• Promoting innovation in Medicaid
• Implementing medical liability reform
• Bringing market dynamics to healthcare