Both Presidents Truman and Clinton had many good reasons for pushing heath care reform. They each recognized the need for a better health care system that would be able to accommodate all Americans and treat any health problems they may have. .
President Harry Truman believed that "healthy citizens constitute our greatest national resource." (Tighe 435) And that "The welfare and security of our Nation demand that the opportunity for good health be made available to all, regardless of residence, race, or economic status." (Tighe 435) Truman felt that a national health program must include public-health services, medical research and education funding, more hospitals and doctors, insurance, protection against loss of earning. He felt particularly strongly about the need for national health insurance. Truman felt that a national insurance program would help alleviate many problems such as there being few doctors in areas where many people could not afford medical care. It would also ensure that children would receive adequate dental care and that all people would be covered incase of a surprise illness that all but the wealthiest people would be able to have treated.
President Clinton also believed that the health care system needed reforming. He said "despite the dedication of literally millions of talented health care professionals, our health care is too uncertain and too expensive, too bureaucratic and too wasteful. It has too much fraud and greed." (Tighe 469) He thought that a reformed health care system should have six main points: security, simplicity, savings, choice, quality, and responsibility. Clinton said that "on any given day over 37 million Americans, most of them working people and their little children, have no health insurance at all"(Tighe 470) and that "our medical bills are growing at over twice the rate of inflation, and the United States spends over a third more of its income on health care than any other nation on Earth.
