6th Congressional hopefuls differ on health care reform

Republican U.S. Rep. Peter Roskam and his Democratic challenger for the 6th Congressional District seat, Michael Mason, are on two different sides of the spectrum when it comes to the Affordable Care Act.

Roskam, of Wheaton, said he feels the structure of the act is “very unstable” and he believes it is “collapsing as it's being constructed.”

“The Affordable Care Act was moved through Congress on a partisan basis, with not much debate, not much discussion, and the net result is a bill with laudatory goals but is completely underperforming,” he said.

Mason, on the other hand, said he has agreed with “pretty much everything” that has been done with the act so far. He is unhappy, however, with how polarized the issue has become in Congress.

“Anytime you have over 50 votes to repeal the act in whole or in part, I understand that there's some symbolism there, but there's also a waste of time there,” he said. ”I don't know why the two sides don't try to get together and try to fix the things that may possibly be standing in the way of it.”

Instead of repealing the whole act, Roskam said he is focused on fixing the broken parts of the health care system.

For example, he said he would like to open health care markets across state lines to allow for the purchasing of health insurance in a competitive, nationwide system, the same way people currently purchase car insurance.

“These health carriers get to have fairly monopolistic, not exclusively monopolistic, but fairly dominant positions in marketplaces, and the normal market forces are insulated against them,” he said.

In addition, he is hoping for more transparency regarding how much medical treatments cost.

“Right now we have a system that has isolated out the two people that should know the most about a procedure ... and that is the patient and the physician. They know nothing about the cost of a procedure,” he said. “We know the price point of gasoline by not even getting out of our cars and yet we have turned the price question on a medical procedure into almost an offensive question.”

Mason, a retired U.S. Postal Service executive from Naperville, said he would like to look into addressing the need to provide people with affordable health care alongside rising tuition costs and the student loan crisis.

He suggested that perhaps the government should open free clinics that would be run by doctors who commit to several years of service. In return, the government would help pay down the doctors' student debt, which he said often runs between $100,000 and $200,000.

Mason acknowledged there would be costs associated with such a program, but he believes it would help lower hospital and emergency room costs.

“It's like a winning proposition for everyone involved,” he said.

The 6th Congressional District stretches from Naperville to Tower Lakes and includes parts of Cook, DuPage, Kane, Lake and McHenry counties.