Letter: Examine rising health care costs

Congress has passed a first strike against the Affordable Care Act, or ACA (Obamacare). However, the Congressional Budget Office estimates that if these taxes levied on the higher income brackets were removed, that there would be an immediate windfall for the 400 highest and other high earners. But this would cause a loss of revenue for the subsidies currently paid for those households of modest income in the 20 smallest states. This explains some of the enthusiasm of those who wish to repeal this law, but it is an anti-social attitude.

There is room for improvement in reducing hospital costs, which in turn has contributed to increases in premiums. Public hospitals are required to treat all patients even if they do not have insurance. This raises the costs to others. Private insurance companies are competing for profit so having multiple insurance companies raises costs because of the duplication of administration. Protecting the 20 million who have insurance under the ACA, is not simple. The cause of rising costs must be identified before corrections can be made.

It is also false economy to defund Planned Parenthood. If family planning is not accessible, women will have more children than they can afford. Yet there is no provision for the government to give extra support for these children. Many women need to work to feed their families so causing women to have more children than they can support is a shortsighted strategy. To remove services for low income earners shows a callous attitude.

Sonia Ettinger

Iowa City