Eliminating employer-sponsored health care is a step that Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah, says will make health care better and more affordable.

Bennett was in Salt Lake City on Friday to pitch his proposed Healthy Americans Act to attendees of the fourth annual Health Disparities Conference, hosted by the Multicultural Health Network of Utah.

The act, he said, would allow consumers to choose their own health-care plans, using their own tax-deductible money. The theory: If people are no longer tied to their health insurance companies through an employer, "all of a sudden (insurers) will clean up their act."

Those at the conference expressed concerns about health-care disparities. They also wanted to know whether companies would be required to insure those currently uninsurable, such as cancer survivors.

Bennett said competition in a free market system would have insurers courting all types of patients, while at the same time adding transparency so patients could make more informed health care decisions.

While she didn't endorse Bennett's plan or any other proposal for reform, Sabrina Morales, executive director of Comunidades Unidas, said as policymakers debate health-care reform, they need to take into account disparities faced by a growing population of racial and ethnic minorities.

"We are looking for a holistic program that includes covering the ethnic communities in a culturally competent way," Morales said.

Bennett said the act, co-sponsored by Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., would help reduce disparities by providing "better coverage at a lower cost" and would provide a tax credit for those who couldn't otherwise afford it. His plan, he said, would help those least likely to have insurance, including healthy young working males, the Hispanic working poor and rural homemakers.

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