After all, it calls for buying out for-profit insurance companies and hospitals, and consolidating them with nonprofits under one organization to create universal health care.
But the Utah Health Policy Project hopes their call for a statewide health insurance plan that would cover all Utahns for "medically-necessary services" will be a starting point, as policy makers grapple with fixing a sick health care system.
"We're articulating the ideal," said Judi Hilman, executive director of the Utah Health Policy Project, which advocates for the un- and under-insured. "We want people to wrestle with it and make it better, make it more realistic. We need something bold or we're not going to have a health-care system anymore."
Hilman is scheduled to formally unveil the proposal, called the Utah Health Cooperative, today.
The goal is to address the rising health-care costs that are crippling Utah's small businesses and families, and to help reduce the growing ranks of the uninsured.
The plan notes that Americans spend more per capita on health costs than other first-world nations, but its quality of care ranks the lowest. The report blames bureaucracy and insurance industry profits for the rising costs.
Utah small businesses, which dominate the economy, have responded by passing on higher premiums to their workers, or reducing or eliminating benefits. By some estimates, Utah's uninsured rate is higher than the national average.
Hilman's group says universal coverage could be achieved without more money. Instead of paying premiums, Utahns and businesses would be taxed. That money, along with federal subsidies, would be managed by one nonprofit entity like the cooperative, which would also decide which medical services and prescriptions would be covered and how much doctors and hospitals would be paid.
She said there is growing support for the concepts in the plan by the politically well-placed, including in Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr.'s cabinet.
But while political feasibility isn't part of the equation - "That paralyzes us," Hilman said - there are some elements she hopes will gather momentum.
That includes galvanizing people to be less tolerant of administrative costs and questioning for-profit status of health-care companies.
"This part is not pie in the sky," Hilman said. "We're arguing [health care] is not a commodity. There should be no room in health care for profit taking.
"That will be very controversial."
Intermountain Healthcare, a nonprofit system that operates hospitals, clinics and an insurance plans, is withholding judgment.
"Intermountain Healthcare is very concerned about the problem with people without health insurance," said spokesman Jason Mathis. "We'll study the proposal of the Utah Health Policy Project and we'll continue to work with them and others to find solutions that work for Utah."
