Before analyzing serious solutions to make health care affordable, it is critical to look at the facts: Without any reform, health-care costs are expected to double to $4.3 trillion by 2017, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid services. Moreover, tens of millions of Americans are without health insurance. We can all agree that significant reform is necessary to bring down costs.

Why are health-care costs so high? Excessive regulations have destroyed virtually all competition in the insurance industry; and, under the present system, consumers do not care about the cost of their health-care services, since the government or insurance companies absorb the costs. These two facts guarantee out-of-control prices for health insurance.

We must have competitive insurance markets and consumers with incentives to care about the costs of the health product or service they are purchasing. Competition and private markets keep prices low and the quality of health care high. We must allow insurance companies to sell across state lines and also eliminate many of the regulations placed on insurance companies to allow new competitors into this industry. Consider the cost of elective procedures such as plastic surgery, where prices have barely risen the last ten years while the quality of such procedures has improved tremendously because we do have private markets and competition.

Secondly, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that more than 25% of health-care costs are related to obesity and physical inactivity which trigger heart disease, hypertension and diabetes. Tragically, the government has taken physical fitness out of our schools, while feeding our children unhealthy food, causing much of this crisis. With a senior population about to double to 77 million by 2040, we’d better start producing healthy citizens and return to physical fitness and nutritious foods in our schools or there will be no money to care for our seniors.

Thirdly, the federal government is already heavily involved in health care through Medicare and Medicaid. Both of these programs are going bankrupt. Each year taxpayers are victimized by $100 billion of Medicare and Medicaid fraud. I strongly suggest that Mr. Grayson and the liberals in Congress fix Medicare and Medicaid before implementing more federal control over health care.

As someone who strongly believe that we need to return to our Constitution which greatly limits federal government interference in its citizens affairs, I believe each state should have its own healthcare strategy. Some states have already begun this process, and I believe tort reform should be a component of each state’s strategy. Florida instituted significant tort reform and while it did not lower healthcare costs, it did lower doctors malpractice premiums and allowed many good doctors to continue to practice medicine. The only reason people want federal involvement is so that we can continue to have our children and future generations picking up the tab, not because Reid, Pelosi and our Congress run efficient or creative programs.

The Democrats’ health-care bill will destroy what is great about our current system. America has the best doctors, hospitals and nurses in the world. Adding 30 million citizens and no new doctors into a broken system will clearly harm the quality of our care, result in rationing of services and further increase the tax and debt burden on the nation’s citizens.

Mr. Grayson wants more federal involvement which allows politicians to pay for unaffordable programs by bankrupting our children. Our Constitution dictates that each state decide for itself how to run its health-care program. This unconstitutional bill will give a corrupt Congress more control over our lives. The result is that Americans will be forced to transition from a free, prosperous, God-dependent nation to a corrupt, poor, government-dependent nation. I promise to fight for conservative, free market solutions to our health care cost crisis, and for solutions to create a healthy nation of citizens while retaining the very best doctors and hospitals in the world.