Cardinal Health CEO: Here’s the biggest flaw in the US healthcare system

The future of the US healthcare system is in the spotlight once again as President-elect Donald Trump picks Congressman Tom Price to lead the Department of Health and Human Services.

Price, who is a six-term Republican congressman from Georgia and a former orthopedic surgeon, is a fierce critic of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), largely criticizing how it places government in the middle of a patient’s relationship with his or her doctor.

Yahoo Finance editor-in-chief Andy Serwer sat down with Cardinal Health (CAH) CEO and chairman George Barrett at the EY Strategic Growth Forum in Palm Springs, California, and asked him about the future of the ACA and what he thinks is the biggest flaw in the US health care system.

“Our problems are not our ability to deliver care. It’s systemically how we deal with it in an equitable way and give people access to it,” Barrett told Serwer in the video above. “I don’t know if a pure technical repeal is the direction we’ll go, but I do think it will be modified dramatically. Either way, even if we had a Clinton administration, it would have gone through significant modification because it needs some, particularly around stabilizing the exchanges which have been at the centerpiece of the legislation.”

Over the past six years, the ACA has been a target of criticism by Republicans. Trump repeatedly declared during his campaign that he would make repealing the ACA a priority, even suggesting that Congress would hold a special session to discuss the matter once he was elected. Ahead of the election, Trump said, “Obamacare has to be replaced. And we will do it, and we will do it very, very quickly. It is a catastrophe.”

Despite the challenges that lie ahead for the health care industry and various policies that need to be fixed, Barrett is quick to point out that there is a lot to be proud of regarding the US health care industry, specifically its top-notch care.

“The US system has been criticized a lot. There is a lot of data that says infant mortality is high, that we have too many people that don’t have access to care. These are all true. The paradox though is that we’re delivering the finest care in the world here. So if you were sick anywhere in the world, you’d probably want to come to the US to get treated.”