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U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Alex Azar called Medicare for All a “utopian” and “simplistic” approach to health care that would actually become “Medicare for None” during an interview at the the TIME 100 Health Summit on Thursday.
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“The reason we’re seeing the attractiveness of simplistic notions like Medicare for All is that the Affordable Care Act (ACA) made a lot of promises. It didn’t deliver on them,” Azar said. But, he argued, most Americans “aren’t beguiled by utopian visions of healthcare. The American people actually take a fairly incremental approach to healthcare,” preferring to gradually improve current systems rather than overhauling them entirely.
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Azar — who runs the federal department that oversees, among other offices, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health — was interviewed at the Health Summit by TIME Editor-in-Chief Edward Felsenthal.
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When asked by Felsenthal whether health care is a human right, as Democrats like Elizabeth Warren have argued, Azar said HHS wants everyone to have “access to affordable health care that meets your needs, [and] that’s the highest quality that can possible be delivered…what bows you wrap around that, I don’t know.” He argued that, though the U.S. needs better individual insurance market solutions, many people are satisfied with their coverage through employers, unions or programs like Medicare.
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Azar also discussed the Trump Administration’s larger vision for health care, which hinges on a system that is “personalized, affordable and patient-centric.” He said HHS will continue to drive down costs under the ACA, and work to solve existing public-health crises including youth vaping, opioid addiction, maternal mortality and geographic disparities in health.
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And while Azar said HHS is working hard to drive down everyday health care costs, he said paying for life-saving but expensive cures, like gene therapy, is also a priority for the department.
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“How do we appropriately pay for them, appropriately price them?” he asked. “Because they’re coming. Thank God they’re coming.”
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