‘A sense of urgency’: Sen. Bernie Sanders pushes Vermont health care players on high costs
VTDigger
Earlier this month, health insurance companies asked state regulators for permission to increase their premiums by roughly 9% to 19% — among the highest increases in recent history.
That request drew alarm from residents, officials and lawmakers across the state — including U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.
“Individuals simply cannot afford large rate increases,” Sanders said in an interview with VTDigger. “Businesses can’t afford a large rate increase. And we want to understand what’s going on and what we can do about it.”
That desire culminated in a roundtable discussion in Burlington on Friday afternoon, where Sanders gathered some of Vermont’s top health care leaders — including the health commissioner and the heads of the state’s largest hospital and private insurer — to explain why care is getting increasingly unaffordable.
In a wide-ranging and at times tense conversation, Sanders exhorted participants to bring down costs, repeatedly asking, “What are we doing?”