ATHENS — There are reasons to support efforts in health-care reform. Unfortunately, a letter by David Schoales [“Health insurance doesn't work as a free-market product,” Jan. 9] misses the mark on all accounts.
This letter is an example of agenda trumping reality. Here are a few examples:
• An assertion that “insurance companies are raising our premiums because they can't make money on their investments” ignores the fact that rates in Vermont are carefully approved by state regulators, for whom investment income is not part of the equation.
• “Because the market is not free, insurers can raise our rates whenever they need to.” I am still scratching my head on that one. Rate increases are part of a highly regulated process. The notion that insurance companies can arbitrarily raise rates is patently false.
• “A real single-payer health-care system.” The term “single payer” has become so maligned that it has lost any relationship with its historical definition. It is now a quixotic ideal, and its current use only serves to confuse the public.
I am an ardent supporter of reforms in health care. But I am convinced that the best outcomes will be the product of the best information.
To that end, Schoales's letter is of no utility to advancing reforms in health care.