Many health care reform advocates agree that any changes to the structure of health care won't work without people recognizing their own contribution for good or ill to their own health. "People have more control over not getting sick than they often realize," Atkinson said. "Many diseases are caused by conditions of an unhealthy lifestyle, and we can't expect the structural changes, whatever they are, to be of any benefit if we haven't done all we can to educate people about nutrition, wellness and prevention."

Lawmakers agree that health-care reform is the Rubic's Cube of public policy — with every turn a solution just looks more confounded.

You can hold the overall problem in the palm of your hand:

• 306,500 working Utahns are uninsured
• Less than 45 percent of Utah employers still offer medical insurance benefits.
• No other state has a greater percentage of employers who have stopped offering medical insurance plans the past six years.
• The percentage of children who have become uninsured (43,000) is larger in Utah than in any other state except Vermont.
• Health insurance premiums have risen by more than 100 percent, from $5,660 to $11,500 during the past 10 years.

Despite an economy virtually aglow with surpluses, those kinds of numbers are sobering to the numerous government, chambers of commerce and community service entities, all of which have been hammering on possible approaches for more than a year.

Many lawmakers say it's best that a solution be market-driven. At a summit this past fall, representatives from different parts of the health-care industry could not even agree if it's really broken or to what degree.

As John T. Nielsen, health-care reform adviser to the governor keeps saying: "The status quo is unsustainable by any measure."

---

E-mail: jthalman@desnews.com