Carson's new healthcare plan would create lifelong savings accounts

Neurosurgeon Ben Carson says he would create a tax-free health savings account for each person upon birth, in lieu of Obamacare.

The Republican presidential contender released a blueprint Wednesday to replace Obamacare and reform Medicare and Medicaid should he win the White House. Carson, who has been a strong critic of President Obama's healthcare law, says he would ditch the entire thing and instead set up so-called "health empowerment accounts," which could be used throughout people's lives to pay for health expenses.

Carson's tax-free HEAs would be transferable among family members and paired with high-deductible health plans to cover the biggest medical costs. His plan doesn't detail whether the savings accounts would be mandatory or how contributions into them would work.

But in his healthcare proposal, Carson focused mainly focuses on changes he would make to Medicare and Medicaid, the federal government's big health insurance programs for the poor, disabled and elderly.

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