There, Sebelius addressed the health care debate in Washington. Next week, President Obama plans to shore up support for health care legislation at a joint session of Congress. There's a question as to whether he will continue to press for a public plan to compete with private insurers given the fierce Republican and industry opposition.
But at an invite-only event this morning sponsored by AARP and the Maine Women's Lobby, Sebelius responded unequivocally when asked whether a public option should be included in the legislation.
"I do. And I think that the goal is in the new market place, in a health insurance exchange, to hold down costs, to have some competition and to provide choice. Those are all free-market principals," Sebelius said.
Sebelius set off speculation that the Obama administration had given up on a public option when on CNN last month she said that such a plan was "not the essential element" for reform. But during her Maine visit, she praised the idea of a government-run competitor.
"In lots of the country, my home state of Kansas, for instance, one insurance company dominates the bulk of the state," she said. "It's a monopoly, it doesn't offer choice, which is why in our state employee health plan, we created a public option side-by-side to the company plan so that state employees could have choices. That's really what's being contemplated."
At a roundtable with 50 people, almost all entirely women, Sebelius reassured the audience that comprehensive health reform was attainable. "Don't let anybody disabuse you of the notion that somehow health reform is dead or that it's been sidetracked. Four of five congressional committees have completed their work and are poised with bills that have been thoughtfully and carefully considered and negotiated."
The fifth is the Senate Finance Committee, to which Maine Senator Olympia Snowe belongs. Snowe, who supports a public option if market reforms fail to reduce insurance costs, has emerged as the Republican on the committee most open to bipartisan legislation. As a result, she's become the focus point of interest groups on both sides of the issue, as well as Democrats.
While the roundtable was billed as an forum for Sebelius to talk about the impact health reform would have on women and seniors, others thought that Sebelius' visit could serve another purpose. Democratic Maine Congresswoman Chellie Pingree was also a speaker at the event.
"I think we all know in Maine that Senator Snowe is going to play a key role, has been working extremely hard on trying to craft a bipartisan plan. And we hope the Secretary's presence also encourages her to keep working at it."
Sebelius spoke to a friendly audience of about 50 people, many of them lobbyists invited by AARP or the Women's Lobby. Organizers said they wanted to have as intimate a setting as they could for women to tell their personal stories about health care.
That didn't sit well with critics of Democratic health care proposals. "I think that federal health reform is too important just to have it be invitation only to special interests. This is a conversation with the American people."
Tarren Bradgon, CEO of the Maine Heritage Policy Center, says that had he had an audience with Sebelius he would have challenged her characterization of Maine as a health reform leader. He says that the state invested too much money in Medicaid expansion and Dirigo Health. The government-sponsored insurance program, which he likens to the public option, offers coverage on ability to pay but has been plagued by funding problems and enrollment is currently capped.
"If our expansive Medicaid rolls and our disastrous public plan Dirigo are bankrupting Maine, bringing in the rest of the country is not going to make it cheaper. It may make other states pay for it, but it's certainly not going to make it cheaper here in Maine."
Bragdon also questioned the special focus on women at the forum, saying that health reform is equally important for men and women.
But speakers at the roundtable say that women are more vulnerable to high health care costs because on average they make less money than men.
"Women have higher rates of some chronic conditions and having inadequate insurance, or no insurance at all, is particularly harmful for women who over the course of their lifetimes use the health care system more than men, in part because of our reproductive health care needs, and in part because we actually access preventative care," said Sarah Standiford, Executive Director of the Maine Women's Lobby.
"I worry every day that I might stumble, trip, fall," Livermore Falls resident Betty Wilkins told Sebelius. Wilkins said she is currently uninsured. "I'm hopeful that some meaningful reform can happen and people like me who are in between jobs can find some sort of coverage or services that can become available and affordable."
What President Obama envisions now for health reform will be revealed in his speech to Congress September 9. Sebelius said that that speech will help "focus the debate" and allow Congress to finish its work.