Sens. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) and Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) disagree on the overall role the federal government should play in healthcare policy, but they agree that states should take the lead in finding solutions.
“I think the way to really handle healthcare would be to use 50 state laboratories, where the federal government provides money, some regulation, but the states themselves work out their own healthcare with their own demographics,” Hatch said Wednesday on CBS’s “The Early Show.”
Sanders slammed the current U.S. healthcare system, saying “we spend more and get less” because of the role of insurance companies.
“Where I do agree with Senator Hatch is I would like to see some states, perhaps the state of Vermont, lead the country in going forward with a Medicare-for-all, single-payer program which says every man, woman and child has healthcare as a right,” Sanders said.
Hatch responded, “Well, I think Vermont would be a lot better off if they could do that. I think Bernie’s right on that.”
Hatch said the federal healthcare law being put in place now is a “socialist approach to medicine” and a “one size fits all” plan that will not work.
“The idea to say people don’t like federal healthcare programs is totally wrong,” Sanders responded.
Both senators agreed they could support Vermont’s plans going forward.
Hatch told CBS he thought the two senators could work together even though Sanders “approaches things far differently and believes in the federal government a lot more than I do.”
This story was originally posted at 10:40 a.m. and has been updated.
