Obama hails 'crucial' Senate healthcare vote
Barack Obama hails Senate committee vote in favour of his healthcare reform as "crucial milestone"
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By inthenews. |  |
Wednesday, 14, Oct 2009 08:17
By Matthew Champion.
A Senate committee approving a bill to overhaul US health insurance is a "crucial milestone" on the road to better healthcare for the poorest Americans, Barack Obama said last night.
But the president said he was not getting complacent about the 14-9 vote in favour of the bill in the Senate finance committee.
"Now is not the time to pat ourselves on the back," President Obama said. "It is time to dig in further and get this done."
He added: "We are closer than ever before to passing healthcare reform but we are not there yet."
Republican Olympia Snowe broke ranks to vote with the Democrats on the committee to approve the bill, saying that "when history calls, history calls".
The bill is the first legislative hurdle in a long process to fulfilling President Obama's main domestic priority of cutting the cost of healthcare and making insurance more affordable.
It approves a ten-year $829 billion (£519 billion) plan to, among other things, subsidise insurance for the poorest and prevent companies from denying coverage for pre-existing conditions.
Almost 30 million Americans will benefit from the reform, President Obama insists, but Republicans remain sceptical of government control of healthcare.
The next stage in the process is for both houses of Congress to pass healthcare reform bills before a conference committee negotiates a final version that President Obama is able to sign into law.