JEFFERSON CITY, MO – What with the presidential non-binding primary over, Missouri is more than just one of three states where Rick Santorum surprised the nation. The Show-Me State is staunch in its opposition to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) – the individual mandate specifically.
Most of the opposition against health reform, including this one, has steered clear of the government's healthcare information technology initiatives, advances that are perceived as bipartisan.
[See also: 'Obamacare' a lightning rod, but what about health IT?.]
The state took a mere four months to pass Proposition C, in fact, the measure that state Sen. Jane Cunningham declared “a message like you wouldn’t believe,” that “the citizens of the Show-Me-State don’t want Washington involved in their healthcare decisions.”
That was August 2010, of course, and the Missouri Health Care Freedom statute aimed to block the federal individual mandate that Missourians either buy health insurance or are punished for not doing so.
And that sentiment, still strong today, has even trickled down to the attorney general level, where Ed Martin was running for U.S. Congress before changing horses mid-stream to take on current Attorney General Chris Koster.
“Over the past three years, I’ve watched President Obama and the federal government impose their will on we the people of Missouri beginning with Obamacare,” Martin explained as his reason for challenging AG Koster. “We Missourians voted to stop Obamacare, yet Attorney General Koster recently stated publicly that, ‘the act of the Legislature to create the exchange is not compelling a person, employer or healthcare provider to participate in a health exchange.’ However, once the exchanges are set up, the government can penalize those who choose not to purchase healthcare.”
Sharing a kinship of attitude, known or otherwise, is likely one of the reasons that Santorum, while boasting on Wednesday of campaign momentum, is also taking shots at both President Obama and Romney over healthcare, asking “when President Obama was pushing forward his radical healthcare ideas [did he] listen to the American people?”
Supporters in Santorum’s victory speech crowd crowed: “No.”
“Why? Because he thinks he knows better how to run your lives and manage your healthcare,” Santorum continued. “If you listen to our message and you found out that on those issues – healthcare, the environment, cap and trade, and on the Wall Street bailouts – Mitt Romney has the same position as Barack Obama.”
Other states that Santorum swept, Colorado and Minnesota each have unique healthcare issues of their own.
In Colorado, for instance, despite opposition to the PPACA, it has somehow managed to become “the only state to pass a bill on a bi-partisan basis and have bi-partisan appointees to the exchange board,” Elisabeth Arneales, health program director of the Colorado Center on Law and Policy told Government Health IT in a story published Monday.
[See also Colorado leader in IT, but balks at insurance exchange.]
Minnesota boasts a healthy appreciation for health IT, and not just the Mayo Clinic, either. The North Star State, in fact, started a public-private initiative long before Congress passed the HITECH Act with its incentives for EHR adoption – such that today more than 90 percent of hospitals have adopted an EHR.
[See also: Minnesota: A healthy appreciation for HIT.]
Santorum won both of those states as well, but that term “non-binding” brings its own share of controversy. In short: Missouri opted to hold a February primary, so even though voters went to the polls on Tuesday, candidates cannot actually collect delegates until a separate caucus in March.
