It's not crisis of care, it's crisis of finance

Our nation does not have a health care crisis. Instead, it has a health care financing crisis. Our nation's health care system is actually pretty good; and folks from all over the world come here for superior health care.

The problem lies with escalating costs of care and in making health care coverage affordable for all. I happen to believe that measures can be taken to make this possible without having the federal government poke its nose further into the health care tent. Sadly, proposals that I've read fail, thus far, to comprehend changes that would make it easier to address the health care financing problem and are an economic disaster in the making.

We have to stop allowing illegal immigrants to flow into this country and make claims upon our health care system. The United States is the most stupid country in the world to allow all of these illegal aliens to remain in the country and have free access to health care and social services provided courtesy of taxpaying legal residents. Where is law enforcement?

Second, the health care financing crisis could be favorably addressed by tort reform laws. No one wants to see wronged individuals fail to get redress, but outrageous settlements in medical malpractice cases do nothing but drive up insurance premiums and encourage "defensive medicine" that involves administering more tests than necessary. No one in the current administration supports tort reform because this would work against major supporters of the administration - the tort lawyers and the insurance companies that write the policies and profit from the premiums.

I encourage all of my fellow citizens to push on linking immigration reform and tort reform to the reform of health care financing. Reform without these steps will be meaningless.

Charles F. Falk

Schaumburg