Healthcare in Rhode Island: shooting for the moon.

Fifty-one years ago, president john f. Kennedy called on the United States to send a man safely to the moon within the decade. This year, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse urged Rhode Island’s Healthcare Reform Commission to define its corresponding “moon shot” for transforming healthcare. We believe Rhode Island is uniquely positioned to help lead the nation toward a shared vision of that “healthcare moon shot.” President Kennedy’s call to action has significant parallels to health policy today. He communicated a clear vision with an inspiring, easily understood goal. His justification was compelling: “because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that goal is one we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win.” Our healthcare system is unaffordable, unsatisfying, and unmanageable. Michael Mullen, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, described healthcare costs as a national security threat. We must drive healthcare costs down while improving access and quality if we are to develop a sustainable economy. The Supreme Court ruling on the Affordable Care Act and the implications of the recent election for the vision of healthcare we will pursue as a nation represent only the beginning of the work faced by our state and others to fundamentally reform healthcare toward an affordable, high quality