No credit is given because, as Campaign Desk has repeatedly pointed out, most people who have studied preventive care know that it does not save money; it costs money. Preventive care may be a good thing, but it does not bend the cost curve. And what’s the secretary’s formula for turning us into a nation of skinny people like you see in old photos from the 1930s and 1950s, before fast foods hijacked the American diet? Obesity and diabetes are terribly complicated, involving many factors far beyond the scope of the Senate health bill.
Gee, we wish David Gregory had challenged the secretary on those points. His interview would have been far more useful if he had done so. Gregory did try to bore down on the tax on Cadillac health plans, asking about the increased spending for subsidies under the bill without any savings materializing from the tax until 2018. On this one, too, Sebelius was her usual media-trained self. But, then again, a campaign stump speech is a campaign stump speech.
