“We will be guided by evidence and effectiveness, not ideology.”

That one statement by former Sen. Tom Daschle stood out today during his confirmation hearings to head our nation’s health system. The words sum up the immense challenge – and ideal – of health care reform. Get rid of the politics and bickering, the marketing and hype, the TV commercials with their luminescent butterflies, and let’s use science and the evidence to find out what works best in health care.

It’s not surprising Robert Pear of the New York Times chose the same quote to lead off his piece on Daschle’s nomination and the road he and President-elect Obama face on health reform.

Daschle’s message of ‘we’re all in this health-care-mess together, so we need to fix it together” came across loud and clear during the hearings. It should carry even more weight in a Congress being bombarded by angry constituents who keep watching their out-of-pocket health costs go up, while corporate America gets billion-dollar taxpayer bailouts.

But as Pear pointed out in his article, opponents of President-elect Obama’s health reform plan are already sharpening their swords, and their rhetoric. Their main target is Obama’s health proposal to give Americans – especially those who don’t have insurance, or are losing their employer coverage due to layoffs – the option to buy into a government-run insurance plan that wouldn’t reject them for pre-existing conditions or other reasons, like private insurance does.

Opponents sniff that letting government offer health coverage that may compete with the giant insurance companies just isn’t fair. Don’t they know we already have a government health coverage option that competes with private insurance – Medicare for seniors? And we know that the private Medicare insurance plans cost us more than the government-run plan: Taxpayers pay private Medicare Advantage plans 113 percent of what expenditures would be under the traditional Medicare program.

Isn't the point of health reform to get Americans the best care at the best price? Or as Jeanne Lambrew, who is in line to be deputy director of a new White House Office of Health Reform, told the Times: “Why should policy makers give private insurers the exclusive right to cover Americans? If private insurers can better meet our goals for the health system, why object to a level competition with public plans?”

If we’re going to fix health care, we have to deal with cost – both in the private and public sector. The insurance giants should be working hard to figure out the best service at the best price, just like government must, and together use the evidence to determine what works best in health care.

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