BILL NUMBER: SB 56INTRODUCED BILL TEXT INTRODUCED BY Senator Alquist JANUARY 20, 2009 An act relating to health care. LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST SB 56, as introduced, Alquist. Health care. Existing law does not provide a system of universal health care coverage for California residents. Existing law provides for the creation of various programs to provide health care services to persons who have limited incomes and meet various eligibility requirements. These programs include the Healthy Families Program administered by the Managed Risk Medical Insurance Board and the Medi-Cal program administered by counties and the State Department of Health Care Services. Existing law provides for the regulation of health care service plans by the Department of Managed Health Care and health insurers by the Department of Insurance. This bill would make legislative findings and declarations regarding health care coverage and would declare the intent of the Legislature to enact and implement comprehensive reforms in the state' s health care delivery system, as specified. Vote: majority. Appropriation: no. Fiscal committee: no. State-mandated local program: no. THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS: SECTION 1. (a) The Legislature finds and declares as follows: (1) Due to the economic downturn, hundreds of thousands of Californians are joining the ranks of the uninsured or are looking to publicly financed programs for their health care coverage. (2) Compared to persons with health care coverage, the uninsured are less likely to have a regular source of care, are likely to delay seeing a doctor, and are less likely to receive preventive health care services. (3) Based on recent data collected by the Kaiser Family Foundation, health care costs continue to rise at a faster rate than general inflation and average wage growth. (4) President Obama has pledged to seek the adoption of major health care reforms at the national level, which are likely to include, at a minimum, additional funding for states as well as increased flexibility for states in how they administer their health care systems. (b) In light of these findings, it is the intent of the Legislature to enact and implement comprehensive reforms in the state' s health care delivery system by 2012 that will accomplish all of the following: (1) Ensure that all Californians have access to affordable, high quality health care coverage. (2) Ensure that the responsibility for providing and paying for health care coverage is equitably shared between employers, individuals, and government. (3) Help contain the long-range rate of growth of health care costs. (4) Reform insurance underwriting and rating practices by reducing the use of medical status or conditions as criteria for the offering or rating of individual insurance products. (5) Improve the health status of Californians and reduce health disparities over time. (6) Ensure fair and adequate payments to health care providers who provide services under the state's publicly funded health care programs. (c) It is further the intent of the Legislature to enact specific reforms by 2010 that will help provide a foundation for any successful health care reform in California, and that will accomplish all of the following: (1) Ensure that all children in the state have access to affordable, high quality health care coverage. (2) Encourage greater use of electronic medical records and other health information technology by health care providers. (3) Make comparative health care cost and quality data more readily available to consumers and purchasers. (4) Make it easier for individuals and small employers to shop for and compare the benefits and costs of competing health plans. (5) Allow all workers to set aside money to pay for health care coverage on a pretax basis. (6) Begin to draw down federal funds that are available for covering low-income adults and families. (7) Reduce the use of medical underwriting in the individual health insurance market, cap health care service plans' and insurers' administrative costs and profits, and establish minimum benefit standards for health plans offered in the state. (8) Allow health plans and employers to offer incentives for enrollees to enroll in and use preventive health care programs that will improve their health. (9) Address health care workforce shortages and better prepare persons for careers in the health care delivery system. (10) Facilitate the formation of public insurer entities, including through better integration of county local initiatives and organized health systems.