Health care reform is a hotly debated topic across the country, and Ohio State professors and students are not shy about voicing their opinions.

Health care is a “kind of problem that needs a big solution,” said Sandra Tanenbaum, an associate professor in the College of Public Health.

Jeff Caswell, professor emeritus in the College of Public Health who specializes in health economics, said the government should “take a big enough step to let people know that this isn’t business as usual. Let’s do it.”

Dr. Robert Wagner, a professor of economics and finance, is worried about how health care reform will affect future generations and increase the national deficit.

“The government should be a partner with an individual, not a provider,” Wagner said.

There are five health reform bills up for vote in Congress: two in the Senate and three in the house.

America’s Healthy Future Act of 2009, led by chairman of the Senate Finance Committee Sen. Max Baucus, will most likely serve as a foundation for legislature and a focus for debate, Caswell said.

The bill outlines, among other things, an individual mandate requiring all U.S. citizens to have coverage.

Caswell said the Baucus Bill makes a substantial effort to cover all people and that the individual mandate is the most likely factor to survive. Part of the individual mandate would define a standard insurance plan to ensure that employers do not limit the quality of the plan offered to employees. However, the Baucus Bill does not include a public option for any individual to purchase and makes no standard for individual plans.

He said other strengths of the bill include proposed government mandated insurance reforms, such as prohibiting companies from denying coverage to people with pre-existing conditions. But prohibiting the limit on maximum expenditures has created a problem for many insured people, Caswell explains. People believe they have adequate insurance until they develop a condition that exceeds their premiums.

The Baucus Bill calls for the use of co-operatives and exchanges to allow people to shop around for the best plan. Caswell said he feels encouraging the growth of co-ops is pretty optimistic without the public option.

Caswell explained that cost is the major problem of the Baucus Bill. If costs were lower, health insurance would be more affordable and create less of a problem for businesses.

Caswell also said he is skeptical of the current cost projections, which is why pulling down costs is critical. It will become increasingly hard to pay for it if costs continue to rise.

“It’s impossible to do this without some form of taxation or complete restructuring of health care,” Caswell said.

He said he would be “astonished” if Congress could to this without increasing the deficit, at least in the beginning.

Wagner is worried this health care bill will only add to the $60 trillion deficit. His solution is to increase competition, which he said will help drive costs down.

Wagner calls for allowing cross-state competition, meaning, for example, if a person lives in California, they can buy an insurance plan they can afford in Utah.

His solution to affordability is offering a tax credit for insurance to anyone who worked and paid taxes, he said. The tax credit would be based on how much an approved coverage plan would cost.

People with pre-existing conditions would be placed into a co-op with other people who have similar pre-existing conditions, and their tax credits would give them the money to buy health insurance.

Caswell said he would like to see some malpractice reform, which is not included in the Baucus Bill, because doctors feel burdened by the threat of malpractice. There also needs to be compromise with the provider community, such as hospitals and pharmaceutical companies, to show them where they fit into the reformed system.

Caswell advises policy makers to be aware that they will not get health care reform perfect all at once.

Wagner and Caswell encourage students to research what is going on in the health care debate. Tanenbaum spent her summer developing content for the Health Foundation of Greater Cincinnati’s Web site and will be speaking to Honors and Scholars later this month.

The John Glenn Civic Leadership Council, College Democrats and College Republicans are hosting a forum on health care on 8 p.m. on Oct. 27. The location is not yet determined, but is tentatively slated for 100 Mendenhall Laboratory.