Sen. McCaskill: Emphasize Prevention to Bring Down Healthcare Costs

Healthcare costs can be reduced by emphasizing prevention rather than rewarding providers for making money from illness, Sen. Claire McCaskill said Tuesday.

"What we've got to do to really bring down healthcare costs is incentivize the system towards prevention in health, as opposed to incentivizing the system that you make more money the sicker people are," the Missouri Democrat told MSNBC's "Morning Joe."

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Republicans have introduced alternatives to Obamacare emphasizing a free-market approach and including tort reforms to lessen costs to medical providers. McCaskill maintained tort reforms "were playing on the margins" and was more of a "political talking point than a real solution to healthcare costs."

"If tort reform were the magic bullet for healthcare costs, we would be enjoying a huge downtick in healthcare costs. You tick off the big states — Florida, Texas, California, my state — major tort reform. And, it hasn't made one bit of a difference in healthcare costs," she said.

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