Quotes & Sayings About Health Care Costs

ozone and particulate matter contribute to 8,800 deaths and $71 billion in health care costs every year. The connection with global warming is nothing more than simple chemistry. Higher temperatures increase the formation of ground-level ozone and particulate matter. Ambient ozone also reduces crop yields and harms the ecosystem. — Heidi Cullen

Without Free Choice Vouchers, there is little in the health reform law that discourages employers from increasingly passing the burden of health care costs onto their employees. — Ron Wyden

But if you - if what - the reports are true, what they're saying is, is that as a consequence of us getting 30 million additional people health care, at the margins that's going to increase our costs, we knew that. — Barack Obama

First of all, pharmaceutical costs are the single fastest-growing part of our health care budget. — John Kitzhaber

Every country in the world is battling the rising cost of health care. No community anywhere has demonstrably lowered its health-care costs (not just slowed their rate of increase) by improving medical services. They've lowered costs only by cutting or rationing them. — Atul Gawande

Reducing health costs and increasing access to health care are worthy goals that every Member of Congress should support. — Jim McCrery

From cell phones to computers, quality is improving and costs are shrinking as companies fight to offer the public the best product at the best price. But this philosophy is sadly missing from our health-care insurance system. — John Shadegg

In speech after speech on his health care plan, the President has tried to convince us that what he is proposing will be good for America. But, how can it be good for America if it raises taxes by a half trillion dollars and costs a trillion dollars or more to implement? — Scott Brown

Education is not confined to books, and the finest characters often graduate from no college, but make experience their master, and life their book. [Some care] only for the mental culture, and [are] in danger of over-studying, under the delusion ... that learning must be had at all costs, forgetting that health and real wisdom are better. — Louisa May Alcott

I am hopeful for the American people that we can actually improve the outlook for bringing down costs in health care. — Eric Cantor

Human capital analysis starts with the assumption that individuals decide on their education, training, medical care, and other additions to knowledge and health by weighing the benefits and costs. Benefits include cultural and other non-monetary gains along with improvement in earnings and occupations, while costs usually depend mainly on the foregone value of the time spent on these investments. — Gary Becker

We must solve the problem in health care by curbing out-of-control costs that erode paychecks for working families and push quality coverage out of reach for millions of Americans. — Paul Ryan

Health-care costs when I got into the industry in '88 were 16 percent a year inflation. When I got out in 1997, they were less than 1 percent. — Rick Scott

If we do nothing, as the Republicans suggest, we're going to see health care costs reach a point where small businesses can't afford it and families can't afford it. We're going to see people turned down from pre-existing conditions. We're going to find the Medicare doughnut hole - a gap in coverage that's going to hurt a lot of seniors. — Dick Durbin

Health care comprises nearly 20 percent of our national economy, but outdated bureaucracy and red tape have stifled competition and raised costs. As a result, today more than 45 million are without any health coverage. — John Shadegg

Reversing the escalation of health care costs is going to need more than legislation, yet it can be done without imposing rationing, as critics of reform fear. — Mitch Kapor

I don't want to suggest that controlling pharmaceutical costs is the answer to what ails the U.S. health care system. It isn't. — John Kitzhaber

Health care costs are an issue both for the government and for our larger economy. — Sylvia Mathews Burwell

I think we can see how blessed we are in America to have access to the kind of health care we do if we are insured, and even if uninsured, how there is a safety net. Now, as to the problem of how much health care costs and how we reform health care ... it is another story altogether. — Abraham Verghese

Get out of debt. In a world of stagnant incomes and rising core expenses like mortgage and health care costs, that's a lot easier said than done. The middle class is under enormous pressure. But families can stop the bleeding by reducing their reliance on debt wherever they can. They can also start fighting back by taking a hard look at whom they do business with and rethinking whether they want tricks-and-traps banks to hold their money. They can also demand that public officials take the side of families over the side of banks. — Elizabeth Warren

Being overweight and obesity are major risk factors for many chronic diseases for South Dakotans of all ages. When people are overweight or obese, they have more health problems and more serious health problems, in addition to higher health care costs. — Mike Rounds

Costs have so consistently outpaced inflation that we now spend one out of every seven dollars the economy produces on health care — T. Colin Campbell

We need to start training more primary health providers and fewer specialists. We will never be able to control health care costs unless we challenge the over-emphasis on medical research, specialists and technology and put more emphasis on delivering good, everyday basic medicine to those who now have none. — Richard Lamm

There is no question that managed care is managed cost, and the idea is that you can save a lot of money and make health care costs less if you ration it. — Charlie Norwood

Illegal immigration costs taxpayers $45 billion a year in health care, education, and incarceration expenses. — Ric Keller

Too many Americans who are uninsured or under-insured do not receive regular checkups because they can't afford coverage or their insurance doesn't cover enough of the costs. The lack of preventive care results in countless emergency room visits and health care disasters for families. — Jeff Merkley

What I was saying back then was that we have a lot of public health costs that taxpayers end up paying for through Medicaid, Medicare, through uncompensated care, because that was in the context of the push for health care reform and that we needed some way to try to defray those costs. — Hillary Clinton

I am actually one of those who took President Obama at his word when he first ran - that he would get us out of ill-advised wars, that he would do something about health care costs, and that he would protect civil liberties. Like many Americans, I was disappointed. — Gary Johnson

If the lifestyle choices outlined in this book were uniformly adopted, the savings in suffering and health care costs would be tremendous. — Tim Loy

Obamacare is a seriously flawed law that makes health care coverage less affordable, costs taxpayers more than advertised and fails to deliver on most of its other grand promises. — Fred Upton

The U.S. has a so-called health care system that has nothing to do with the promotion of health. Those who run this system do not care about your health, and it's far from being a system. It's a fragmented patchwork of procedure-oriented services that are meshed in a voluminous trail of paper payments, with little relevance to community-based needs. This misdirected, disease-managed non-care system of symptom suppression demands more and more treatment at higher and higher costs. If they cared at all, you'd be treated like a human, not like a number resembling, quite frankly, the ear tags on a cattle herd. — Gary Tunsky

Health care costs blunt the competitive edge of American entrepreneurs, from the auto industry to internet start-ups. — Tom Allen

Forty states have sued tobacco companies over the costs of health care for residents on Medicaid and public assistance. — Bill Dedman

The majority of Americans receive health insurance coverage through their employers, but with rising health care costs, many small businesses can no longer afford to provide coverage for their employees. — Jim Ryun

As premiums continue to skyrocket, we must ensure that health insurers are not engaging in anticompetitive behavior and unfairly driving up health care costs. — Diana DeGette

Not even mentioned is the possibility, discussed by economist Dean Baker, that the deficit might be eliminated if the dysfunctional privatized health care system were replaced by one similar to those in other industrial societies, which have half the per capita costs and at least comparable health outcomes. — Noam Chomsky

The surest way to return to the people's business is to listen to the people themselves: We need to drop this whole scheme of federally controlled health care, start over, and work together on real reforms at the state level that will contain costs and won't leave America trillions of dollars deeper in debt. — Scott Brown

It is time that we take control and find a way to curtail the explosive costs of health care. Small businesses deserve a chance to channel these funds toward other needs, such as expanding and creating more jobs for the economy. — Christopher Bond

The Commission agrees that the federal government should help alleviate these costs. The best way to do so is to reduce illegal immigration ... We recommend immediate reimbursement of criminal justice costs, because these conditions can now be met, but we urge further study of the costs of health care and education before impact aid is provided. — Barbara Jordan

Virtually everything that the government does costs more than when the same thing is done in private industry - whether it is building housing, running prisons, collecting garbage, or innumerable other things. Why in the world would we imagine that health care would be the exception? — Thomas Sowell

Given the fact that poverty is growing, more and more Americans are losing health insurance, health care costs are going up, the middle class is shrinking, the gap between the rich and the poor is growing wider.That speaks to the weakness of the opposition. People do not like George W. Bush. But I think it's fair to say that they are not flocking to the Democratic Party, or see the Democrats as a real alternative. — Bernie Sanders

We need to be careful when we talk about cutting health care costs. They are not going to be reduced - what we really want to do is do is slow the rate of increase. — Dave Obey

After political crusades for 'affordable housing' ended up ruining the housing market and much of the economy with it, many of the same politicians are now carrying on a crusade for 'affordable health care.' But what you can afford has absolutely nothing to do with the cost of producing anything. Refusing to pay those costs means that you are just not going to continue getting the same quantity and quality - regardless of what any politician says or how well he says it. — Thomas Sowell

Supported by digital data, new data-driven tools, and payment policies that reward improving the quality and value of care, doctors, hospitals, patients, and entrepreneurs across the nation are demonstrating that smarter, better, more accessible, and more proactive care is the best way to improve quality and control health care costs. — Todd Park

Perhaps one of the most important things you can do for human beings is wean them off an animal-based diet. It hardens the arteries and runs up our health-care costs. The last thing a poor person can afford is a heart attack or cancer or a stroke. And that's all linked to a meat-based diet. I think animal liberation is human liberation. — Ingrid Newkirk

We do not see the sort of fundamental changes that would be necessary to reduce the trajectory of federal health spending by a significant amount and, on the contrary, the legislation significantly expands the federal responsibility for health care costs. — Doug Elmendorf

One of the principal impediments to job creation is uncertainty on the part of American companies, large and small. We've all watched as companies have sat on a lot of capital. They're uncertain about what tax policy is going to be. They're clearly uncertain about how health care costs. They're uncertain about all the regulations on capital markets. — Tom J. Donohue

People don't like it, but inevitably we need to think about both the costs and the benefits of health care. We cannot avoid the financial consequences. — Steven Levitt

We can decide that the presence of cancer-causing substances in our air, water, and food is too expensive. A 2009 study, for example, has found that coal miners in Appalachia costs the region five times more in premature deaths, including from cancer, than it provides to the region in jobs, taxes, and economic benefits. In California, the production and use of hazardous chemicals cost the state $2.6 billion in 2004 alone in lost wages and health-care expenses to treat workers and children with pollution-linked diseases. — Sandra Steingraber

Undocumented immigrants produced $1.58 billion in state revenues, which exceeded the $1.16 billion in state services they received. However, local governments bore the burden of $1.44 billion in uncompensated health care costs and local law enforcement costs not paid for by the state, — Carole Keeton

For example, obesity costs the average person an extra $1,429 per year in increased health care costs. But since we're not required to set aside money for every burger we consume (to cover the real financial cost of the burger), the long-term costs of carrying extra weight remain invisible. — Kerry Patterson

I voted to repeal the government takeover of health care that raises costs, increases taxes, spends trillions of dollars that we don't have, cuts Medicare by $500 billion, and destroys jobs. — Robert Hurt

Many companies today are reducing hours of full-time people to get under the minimum so they don't have to pay health care costs. I just shake my head because that's not going to build long-term value and trust with your people. — Howard Schultz

We cannot continue. Our pension costs and health care costs for our employees are going to bankrupt this city. — Michael Bloomberg

Because what happens is, as the economy suffers, tax revenues go down. But unlike businesses, where at least your variable costs go down, in government your variable costs go up: unemployment insurance, workmen's compensation, health care benefits, welfare, you name it. — Meg Whitman

The ninety-nine cent price of a fast-food hamburger simply doesn't take account of that meal's true cost
to soil, oil, public health, the public purse, etc., costs which are never charged directly to the consumer but, indirectly and invisibly, to the taxpayer (in the form of subsidies), the health care system (in the form of food-borne illnesses and obesity), and the environment (in the form of pollution), not to mention the welfare of the workers in the feedlot and the slaughterhouse and the welfare of the animals themselves. — Michael Pollan

A final irony has to do with the idea of political responsibility. Christians are urged to vote and become involved in politics as an expression of their civic duty and public responsibility. This is a credible argument and good advice up to a point. Yet in our day, given the size of the state and the expectations that people place on it to solve so many problems, politics can also be a way of saying, in effect, that the problems should be solved by others besides myself and by institutions other than the church. It is, after all, much easier to vote for a politician who champions child welfare than to adopt a baby born in poverty, to vote for a referendum that would expand health care benefits for seniors than to care for an elderly and infirmed parent, and to rally for racial harmony than to get to know someone of a different race than yours. True responsibility invariably costs. Political participation, then, can and often does amount to an avoidance of responsibility. — James Davison Hunter

America with 4% of the world's population has 50% of the worlds lawyers ... tort lawyers love to point out that 1% of America's health care cost is used to pay malpractice insurance ... but most doctors practice defensive medicine to avoid malpractice litigation ... these costs are not included in the 1% number above. — Richard Lamm

The cost of health care and the cost of cars and fuel are huge burdens on families and businesses. We can reduce health care costs NOW by promoting biking, walking and transit. — Steve Novick

Health care costs are eating the Defense Department alive. — Robert M. Gates

While Free Choice Vouchers didn't fulfill my vision of a health care system in which every American would be empowered to hire and fire their insurance company, they were a foothold for choice and competition and a safety valve for Americans whose employers are already forcing them to bear more and more of their family's health insurance costs. — Ron Wyden

We need to quit subsidizing the costs for illegal immigrants' residency in America immediately. How long will we allow them to siphon millions upon millions from honest taxpaying Americans by supporting their health care, welfare, education and criminal expenses? — Newt Gingrich

We have over 500,000 illegal immigrants living in Arizona. And we simply cannot sustain it. It costs us a tremendous amount of money of course in health care, in education, and then, on top of it all, in incarceration. And the federal government doesn't reimburse us on any of these things. — Jan Brewer

If you don't have to pay for everything you're providing, why in the world should you cut the cost of it, when it's gonna be covered? That's what's happened to the health care system. Why cut costs when somebody's gonna subsidize whatever you charge. But there's another reason why tuitions are never gonna come down on major American universities, and that's because they are the training ground of American liberalism and radicalism. And they have to make jobs there attractive to the professors and the teachers who are gonna indoctrinate these young skulls full of mush. — Rush Limbaugh

It is now time to reverse the trend we have seen developing over the years, that of beauty at all costs and health will take care of itself. — Bill Munson

Medical costs are soaring because our health-care system is totally screwed up. Doctors and hospitals have every incentive to spend on unnecessary tests, drugs, and procedures. — Robert Reich

I'm no health care expert, but you've got technology that constantly advances the ability to extend life and maybe improve lifestyle. That puts constant upward pressure on health care costs. — Steven Burd

Health care costs are on the rise because the consumers are not involved in the decision-making process. Most health care costs are covered by third parties. And therefore, the actual user of health care is not the purchaser of health care. And there's no market forces involved with health care. — George W. Bush

I think we have to be very careful when we toss around terms like 'cut health care costs.' We would do very well to expect a cut in the rate of increase. — Dave Obey

I am every single day talking with and working with people in my district who are seeing their health care insurance costs go up five times, 105 percent, 300 percent, that are getting pay cuts, that are losing 40-hour workweeks, that are having to work two and three jobs. — Marsha Blackburn

The principal villain in rising health care costs is the government. Not pharmaceutical companies, not doctors, but government. — Neal Boortz

I also rise today in strong support of forward movement on the implementation of health information technology, which has the potential to save the United States billions of dollars in health care costs each year. — Russ Carnahan

I understand that in these difficult economic times, the potential for any additional expense is not welcomed by American businesses. But in the long run, the health insurance reform law promises to cut health-care costs for U.S. businesses, not expand them. — Gary Locke

Costs for liability insurance are higher than costs for many procedures. There is a need to reform liability laws to stop out-of-control health care costs. — Temple Grandin

All I want to do, if you've already got health care, is lower your costs. — Barack Obama

The signs of climate change are visible across the nation, from the drought-stricken fields of Central California to the flooded streets of Michigan. Extreme weather is turning people's lives upside down and costing communities millions of dollars in damaged infrastructure and added health care costs. — Frances Beinecke

Economists have calculated that every dollar invested in high-quality home visitation, day care, and preschool programs results in seven dollars of savings on welfare payments, health-care costs, substance-abuse treatment, and incarceration, plus higher tax revenues due to better-paying jobs.37 — Bessel A. Van Der Kolk

The education system is where young skulls full of mush are programmed and propagandized into the system. They are highly valuable. That's why they're subsidized. You know, universities are approaching the same circumstance we have in health care. What it costs is not related at all to market forces. Meaning what it costs is not related to what people can afford. You get right down to it, how many Americans, how many families can afford 20,000, 30,000, $50,000 a year or semester to send their kids off to college? It has to be subsidized. — Rush Limbaugh

We only gain collectively by acting now. We gain by one day not having to pay a thing for fuel. We gain by having cleaner air, water, and food so that we are healthier and our health care costs come down. We gain by deflating the global fossil fuel markets that drive much of the conflict around the world. — Mark Ruffalo

In our experience at Safeway, we're confident that we can actually improve the quality of health care while taking costs down and using the savings to help finance coverage of low-income people who are clearly going to need help to pay for insurance. — Steven Burd

For everywhere we look, there is work to be done. The state of our economy calls for action: bold and swift. And we will act not only to create new jobs but to lay a new foundation for growth. We will build the roads and bridges, the electric grids and digital lines that feed our commerce and bind us together. We will restore science to its rightful place and wield technology's wonders to raise health care's quality and lower its costs. — Barack Obama

Doing all we can to combat climate change comes with numerous benefits, from reducing pollution and associated health care costs to strengthening and diversifying the economy by shifting to renewable energy, among other measures. — David Suzuki

We've got the emPHAsis on the wrong sylLAble when it comes to crime in this country. The FBI says burglary and robbery cost U.S. taxpayers $3.8 billion annually. Securities fraud alone costs four times that. And securities fraud is nothing to the cost of oil spills, price-fixing, and dangerous or defective products. Fraud by health-care corporations alone costs us between $100 billion and $400 billion a year. No three-strikes-and-you're-out for these guys. Remember the S&L scandal? $500 billion. — Molly Ivins

Our goal is to make Maine the healthiest state in the nation and reduce our overall health care costs. — John Baldacci

I have young kids. The fiscal burden that will be imposed on them is going to depend primarily on whether we tackle this looming problem in our health care system - with rising costs that don't seem, by the way, to be necessarily associated with higher quality. That is the key burden that they will face. — Peter Orszag

People don't actually want to think about their own health and don't take action until they are sick. Yet employers are very motivated to get their employees healthy, since they bear most of the burden of their health care costs. — Clayton Christensen

A common misconception is that the costs of health care are cheaper in rural America, when in fact the reality is that they are more expensive and more difficult to access. — Blanche Lincoln

Women know the financial, social and physical costs of not having access to basic health care. — Martha Plimpton

Since 1994, lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have considered it politically risky to offer a plan to fix America's broken health care system. The American public, though, has paid the price for this silence as health care costs skyrocketed, millions went uninsured, and millions more grappled with financial insecurity and hardship. — Ron Wyden

Emergency health care for illegal aliens along the southwestern border is already costing area hospitals $200 million a year, with perhaps another $100 million in extended care costs. — Gary Miller

How much does it cost to treat leprosy? One $3 dose of antibiotic will cure a mild case; a $20 regimen of three antibiotics will cure a more severe case. The World Health Organization even provides the drugs free,
but India's health care infrastructure is not good enough to identify the afflicted and get them the
medicine they need.

So, more than 100,000 people in India are horribly disfigured by a disease that costs $3 to cure.
That is what it means to have a per capita GDP of $2,900. — Charles Wheelan

We really do have to get at the underlying question of health-care costs. — Angela Braly

Why should a company like Wal-Mart - who made $10 billion last year alone - be able to force taxpayers to foot the bill for their health-care costs? — John Sweeney

What we want is for people to know that you can get affordable health care and most young Americans, they're not covered and the truth is they can get coverage all for what it costs to pay your cell phone bill. — Barack Obama

One reason for the tremendous increase in health-care costs in the U.S. is managerial neglect of the "hotel services" by the people who dominate the hospital, such as doctors and nurses. — Peter Drucker

And so our goal on health care is, if we can get, instead of health care costs going up 6 percent a year, it's going up at the level of inflation, maybe just slightly above inflation, we've made huge progress. And by the way, that is the single most important thing we could do in terms of reducing our deficit. That's why we did it. — Barack Obama

$13 to $20 billion a year could be saved in health care costs by demedicalizing childbirth, developing midwifery, and encouraging breastfeeding. — Frank A. Oski

If you take your kid in for the sniffles, you pay $20, but the full cost is $200. And so we need to get back to the price system where you see the full cost of health care, and then people will make smarter decisions. That will reduce health care costs, and it's a huge part of our economy. — Dave Brat

By computerizing health records, we can avoid dangerous medical mistakes, reduce costs, and improve care — George W. Bush

The pressure to reduce health care costs is aimed only at the treatment of real diseases. There is no pressure to reduce the costs of treating fictitious diseases. On the contrary, there is pressure to define ever more types of undesirable behaviors as mental disorders or addictions and to spend ever more tax dollars on developing new psychiatric diagnoses and facilities for storing and treating the victims of such diseases, whose members now include alcoholics, drug abusers, smokers, overeaters, self-starvers, gamblers, etc. — Thomas Szasz