WASHINGTON – To warm words from President Barack Obama, the Democratic leaders of the Senate health committee unveiled a revised plan Thursday to provide health coverage to nearly all Americans.

The plan would require most employers to offer benefits to their workers or pay fees to the government and would create a public competitor to insurance companies.

The proposal clears the way for the committee to vote on a package next week as the House and the Senate hustle to pass separate health bills this month before Congress leaves on its August break. But a second Senate panel, the finance committee, is still struggling to reach consensus.

The Senate health committee's blueprint builds on an incomplete version that was much criticized two weeks ago when the Congressional Budget Office reported that it would cost more than $1 trillion over 10 years and still leave up to 37 million Americans uninsured. That budget report was widely considered a setback for a health care overhaul, Obama's top domestic priority.

Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., the health committee chairman, and Sen. Christopher J. Dodd, D-Conn., subsequently filled in details of the plan and scaled back subsidies that would help low-income people buy insurance.

The plan would cover 97 percent of Americans.

The New York Times

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