William Corr, Class of 1973, who was appointed Deputy Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services by President Obama in January 2009, addressed the reasoning behind the recently passed health reform legislation’s controversial mandate that Americans who aren’t currently covered under an employer-provided medical plan, Medicare or Medicaid must purchase some form of health insurance in his talk at Vanderbilt Law School on April 8.
The overhaul also requires that insurance companies cover everyone, including those with pre-existing conditions, and for such a system to work, "you have to bring everyone in and create a healthier insurance pool,” Corr said. “If you don’t require everyone to have insurance, sick people will come into the plan while healthier people stay out” until they develop a health issue and need coverage. “The legislation also establishes many new rules” to help individuals get and keep insurance, he said, including one rule particularly important to Americans who must rely on individual coverage: “An insurance company can’t drop you when you get sick.”
In his hour-long talk to an audience that included students and faculty from Vanderbilt’s law, medical and business schools, Corr did not dwell on the Obama Administration’s bruising battle to pass the landmark legislation. After providing an overview of what the health care overhaul would accomplish, Corr discussed the scope of the overhaul, which addresses not only accessibility of medical insurance, but also calls for the implementation of electronic medical records, bolsters support for primary care clinics and personnel in underserved areas, and devotes additional resources to detecting Medicare and Medicaid fraud.
Corr also addressed concerns about the impact and implementation of the health care overhaul. “We know how to do public health better than we have been,” he said.
Corr noted that some provisions of the legislation will not take effect until 2014. “Being responsible for implementation, that feels like it’s the next day,” he said. Intermediate steps in the overhaul include curbs on some industry practices. Starting this summer, for example, dependent children may remain covered under a parent’s medical insurance plan through age 26. “No children with pre-existing conditions can be denied coverage,” Corr said. “The legislation also bans lifetime and annual caps on coverage. And it establishes rate review authority; to the extent that insurers spend less than 85 percent of premiums providing for health care, we can order rebates to individual insureds.”
Despite the challenge he and his colleagues face in implementing the massive overhaul, Corr said, “Thirty-seven years ago, I thought it would be really cool to be involved in the health system as a lawyer, and today, I wouldn’t be anywhere else in the world.” Corr credited Professor James Blumstein, a nationally renowned health law scholar who joined Vanderbilt’s law faculty in 1970, with sparking his interest in health law and policy.
Corr’s appearance at the law school was sponsored by the Health Law Society and underwritten by the Hyatt Student Activities Fund. He was introduced by 3L C.J. Stimson, who will graduate with a J.D./M.D. from Vanderbilt’s law and medical schools this year. Stimson will start his surgical residency at Vanderbilt Medical Center this summer.
Corr has devoted his career to addressing health policy issues. Before he was appointed Deputy Secretary of Health and Human Services by President Obama in early 2009, Corr spent nine years as the executive director of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, a private, non-profit organization that advocated policies and actions to reduce tobacco use among both children and adults.
Corr earned his undergraduate degree in economics at the University of Virginia. Immediately after earning his law degree at Vanderbilt, he spent four years directing four private, non-profit, community-run health centers in Appalachia. He moved to Washington, D.C., in 1977, to serve as an attorney for the House Energy and Commerce Committee, working first for Representative Paul Rogers (D-FL) and then for Representation Henry Waxman (D-CA) as counsel to the Subcommittee on Health and the Environment. In the late 1980s, Corr moved to the Senate to serve as chief council and staff director of the Judiciary subcommittee on Antitrust, Monopolies and Business Rights under Senator Howard Metzenbaum (D-OH); he also assisted Metzenbaum as a member of the Senate Labor and Human Resources Committee.
Corr joined the Department of Health and Human Services during the Clinton Administration, serving as the agency’s Chief of Staff and as principal advisor to Secretary Donna E. Shalala on policy and management issues and initiatives. Corr worked as chief counsel and policy director for Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle from 1998 through 2000 before joining the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids.