There is a passionate debate today about health care in this country. There ought to be. There is no issue of more universal concern than the medical care of our families, and there is no sector of the American economy in greater need of reform than the health-care industry.

There is even debate about the debate itself, especially the nature of some of the most vocal opposition to reform. It is true that some detractors, including respected political figures and elected leaders, have resorted to spreading deliberate and sometimes outrageous misinformation.

While this is a disservice to the public and to democratic discourse, it does not discount the widespread – and justified – anxiety about health-care reform felt across the political and economic spectrum. I have traveled all across the state, and everywhere I’ve gone concern over health-care reform has dominated discussions.

John Kenneth Galbraith said, “All of the great leaders have had one characteristic in common: It was the willingness to confront unequivocally the major anxiety of their people in their time. This, and not much else, is the essence of leadership.”

Simply put, we proponents of health-care reform must be better leaders in confronting the anxieties of our constituents, and we must not be deterred from taking our message directly to the people.

During my recent 67-county trip across the state, I held hour-or-more-long meetings at each stop. Inevitably, and appropriately, the vast majority of the conversations were consumed by questions about health care.

Pennsylvanians want and deserve to know how the current House plan would impact them.

That’s why, on the first day of the August recess, I hosted a Working Families Summit with representatives from

58 community-service providers and offered a forum for the health-care debate in my district. That’s why I joined the Broad Street Ministry in Philadelphia for a health care town hall this past week. And that’s why I’ve appeared on Fox News and other channels repeatedly to press the case for reform.

I encourage all of my Democratic colleagues to do the same – keep hosting town halls, keep engaging your constituents, and do not shy from leadership when it is needed most.

I entered politics to see that all Americans are provided access to quality health care, and I am convinced that the bill we passed in my committee, the America’s Affordable Health Choices Act, is the right one.

Under this plan, if you have insurance and want to keep it, the only thing that will change is for it to cause your premiums to go down, and Medicare benefits will be preserved and improved by closing the so-called prescription drug “doughnut hole.”

The bill establishes a set of minimum benefits that all insurance plans must cover.

No longer will insurance companies be allowed to deny coverage for medically necessary care or refuse those with pre-existing conditions.

A recent Harvard University study shows that two-thirds of bankruptcies are related to medical expenses – and four out of five Americans driven to bankruptcy by medical costs actually had insurance.

This legislation caps the amount of money an insurer can require you to pay out of pocket and eliminates lifetime caps on insurance coverage so that no more Americans will be driven into bankruptcy by illness or injury when they have purchased insurance specifically to protect them from that situation.

The bill will finally put an end to some of the worst practices of the insurance industry, including the practice of “recision” in which insurers deny coverage based on clerical errors on subscribers’ initial applications – sometimes after they’ve spent years paying into the system.

The plan incorporates a choice for individuals of a strong public option with low overhead costs – and no millions spent on CEO pay – to introduce needed competition into the monopolized world of health insurance to create the competition needed to raise standards and drive down costs.

Insurance market reforms and the establishment of a health insurance exchange will put in place constructive and transparent competition among insurance providers.

No longer will insurers compete to see who can deny the most care, but rather who can provide the best care at the lowest cost.

An opportunity like this to create meaningful change comes once in a generation.

Fifteen years ago, we missed our chance, and millions of Americans have suffered for it. Health-care reform is an economic imperative as well as a moral one.

We cannot abide a failure of leadership now. We owe it to our children to refuse to be shouted down, while also understanding the anxiety of Americans in this savage recession. We have the best case for caring for all Americans – now we need to take it directly to the people.



U.S. Rep. Joe Sestak, D-7th, is a candidate for the U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania and is a member of the Committee on Education and Labor and the Health, Employment, Labor and Pensions Subcommittee.