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Jan. 28, 2008 -- President Bush proposed new tax breaks for individuals who buy their own health insurance, making the proposal the only new health care initiative of his final year in office.
The proposal came in President Bush's final State of the Union address to Congress Monday night. In it he proposed making the cost of individual insurance tax deductible, a benefit now reserved for employer-sponsored coverage.
"This one reform would put private coverage within reach for millions, and I call on?the Congress to pass it this year," the president said.
The policy would let people who purchase medical coverage on the individual market deduct the costs of the coverage from their taxes. Right now such coverage is not deductible, though individuals may save some money tax-free in health savings accounts to spend on medical care.
The president's proposal faces hurdles in Congress. Democrats who control Congress have shown little appetite for the individual insurance market, where coverage is usually far more expensive than in group coverage purchased through an employer.
But the plan echoes that of several Republican presidential candidates. Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, Arizona Sen. John McCain, and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney all favor changing the tax code in ways similar to the president's proposal. Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani also favors the change, along with offering a $15,000 tax exemption available to families to buy coverage.
The tax proposal was the only new health care policy Bush announced in the speech Monday. He reiterated past calls for expanding health savings accounts, allowing employer and membership organizations to band together across state lines to buy cheaper coverage in Association Health Plans, and curbing medical malpractice liability lawsuits.
None of the policies is popular with Democrats.
"I don't think we'll see any significant health policy changes in the 110th ," Rep. Phil Gingrey, a Georgia Republican and physician, told WebMD.
Bush also repeated calls for Congress to ban the cloning of embryos. Many members of Congress, including some conservative Republicans, want to ban cloning for reproductive purposes but keep it legal for the purposes of stem cell research.
The president called attention to a research trial reported in November in which scientists succeeded in programming skin cells to act like stem cells. That could give them the ability to grow into many different bodily tissues, making them candidates for potential disease cures.
"This breakthrough has the potential to move?us beyond the divisive debates of the past by extending the?frontiers of medicine without the destruction of human life," Bush said.
The White House is at an impasse with Congress over embryonic stem cell research. Congress passed a repeal of federal research limits, only to have it vetoed by the president.
"I am glad that President Bush has recognized the recent advances in stem cell research. This again highlights the need for a new, national initiative supporting all types of ethical cell-based research, including embryonic stem cell research," Rep. Diana DeGette, D-Colo., author of several stem cell research and cloning bills, said in a statement.