[and this isn't even addressing the underinsurance problem]
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/16/health/policy/16obama.html
The New York Times
June 16, 2009
As Obama Pushes Health Issue, Cost Concerns Arise
By ROBERT PEAR and JACKIE CALMES
<snip>
But as the president spoke at the annual conference of the American
Medical Association in Chicago, it became clear that one of the major
health plans on the table would cost at least $1 trillion over 10 years
yet leave tens of millions of people uninsured.
<snip>
An analysis released Monday by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget
Office raised the hurdles for draft legislation in the Senate just as
its Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee planned to begin
voting on Wednesday. The office concluded that a plan by the
committee's Democratic leaders, Senators Edward M. Kennedy of
Massachusetts and Christopher J. Dodd of Connecticut, would reduce the
number of uninsured only by a net 16 million people. Even if the bill
became law, the budget office said, 36 million people would remain
uninsured in 2017.
That finding came as a surprise. Robert D. Reischauer, an economist who
headed the budget office when Congress tackled the health care issue in
the Clinton administration, said that if so many people remained
uninsured, it might not be feasible to cut special federal payments to
hospitals that serve many low-income people.
Mr. Obama said Saturday that the government could save $106 billion
over 10 years by cutting such hospital payments as more people gained
coverage.
<end excerpt>
Michael