Romney on ’60 Minutes’: Uninsured Can Go to ER

On CBS’ “60 Minutes” on Sunday night, Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney revealed his new plan for the millions of Americans who don’t have any health care coverage: Go to the emergency room.

“Well, we do provide care for people who don’t have insurance,” he told Scott Pelley during the interview. “If someone has a heart attack, they don’t sit in their apartment and die. We pick them up in an ambulance, and take them to the hospital, and give them care. And different states have different ways of providing for that care.”

Yes, this is the same man who implemented the universal health care law in Massachusetts while he was the governor. It’s also the same man who reiterated the need for universal coverage back in 2010 during an appearance on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.”

“Look, it doesn’t make a lot of sense for us to have millions and millions of people who have no health insurance and yet who can go to the emergency room and get entirely free care for which they have no responsibility, particularly if they are people who have sufficient means to pay their own way,” he said back then.

Here’s a new defense for Romney if he’s asked again about his 47 percent remark (and he most likely will be): “Hey, I often say things I don’t mean!”

— Posted by Tracy Bloom.