Senate Republicans tout alternative Pennsylvania healthcare plan

Republican Pennsylvania senators are promoting a healthcare plan they say will help more people for less money than a proposed expansion of government-subsidized insurance championed by Gov. Ed Rendell. More than half a million uninsured, low-income Pennsylvanians would obtain access to healthcare under the "HealthNet PA" plan, said Sen. Edwin B. Erickson, chairman of the Senate Public Health and Welfare Committee. The package of more than a dozen bills calls for an expansion of health insurance coverage that is more limited than the plan envisioned by the Rendell, coupled with measures intended to broaden the network of free health clinics for the poor and provide insurance coverage for people who cannot get it because of pre-existing health conditions.