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Continue reading Dr. Quentin Young, Longtime Obama Confidante, Criticizes Administration’s Refusal to Consider Single-Payer Healthcare (2 parts) →

Rally: Single-Payer/Improved Medicare for All
at Regional Forum on Health Reform

Time: Tuesday the 17th at 11am

Where: Davis Center, UVM

The Obama Administration has asked governors to host regional forums on health reform. The forum in Vermont is on St. Patrick’s Day, March 17th at the Davis Center, UVM, hosted by Governor Douglas and Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick.

This should be the beginning of a serious dialogue that recognizes that health care is a human right. Fundamental health reform – which enjoys solid majority support from the public – has become even more urgently needed with the severe economic recession. But we’re told by a Douglas spokesperson, “the session may have a limited guest list.” The President has promised an open, transparent process, with all proposals considered — yet there’s no information about how to participate!Health Insurance CEOs Pocket Average $14.2 Million

The Labor Campaign for Single Payer is joining with the Health Care is a Human Right campaign, Vermont Health Care for All and others to organize a peaceful protest in front of the summit meeting at noon – hopefully in support of single-payer/improved Medicare for All spokespersons inside the meeting. If there ever was a day to drop what you are doing and come, this is it. Continue reading Vermont AFL-CIO Calls Single Payer Rally at Burlington Regional Health Care Forum →

No Reason to Demonize U.S. Single-Payer Health: John F. Wasik
Commentary by John F. Wasik

 

 

March 11 (Bloomberg) — It’s time to stop kicking sand in the face of single-payer health care. It may be the trongest solution around to insure every American at a lower cost.

After decades of industry campaigns against this model — dubbed by its critics as “socialized” medicine — it’s important to stop whining and evaluate the many economic benefits. Health care is a fundamental human right.

If President Barack Obama wants real change in American health care, he will have to get over the fear of even mentioning single-payer concepts. At his health-care summit last week, only the threat of a demonstration garnered late invitations for Oliver Fein and Congressman John Conyers, two leading proponents of the single-payer plan.

Health-care costs have become a crippling personal-finance burden for 45 million uninsured and 25 million underinsured Americans. Those outside of the fractured employer-based system are only one illness away from financial ruin.

Lose your job and most likely your health coverage will disappear unless you want to pay exorbitant rates. And it’s getting worse. Because of the growing jobless rate, some 14,000 Americans are losing their coverage daily, according to the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

A single-payer plan would cover everybody regardless of employment situation and save money by cutting out middlemen.

Continue reading Bloomberg Financial News: Single Payer Healthcare is Strongest Solution →

by Randy Shannon

While AFSCME and SEIU have been pusuing talks with the health insurance industry to craft a joint position on healthcare reform, the insurance industry has been waging war against any proposals that would impact their growing profits. The two unions have finally given up on partnering with the health insurance industry. The insurers are in healthcare reform talks for one purpose only – protect profits. These profits are extracted by raising premiums and denying care.

The unions’ withdrawal from talks exposes the bankruptcy of the labor-managment partnership model for solving the healthcare crisis. The insurers are opposed to Medicare for All and to Obama’s attempts to adjust the current system. The insurers want the taxpayers to fund additional premiums and the government to force everyone to buy their paltry coverage. Profit is their only reason for being. The only solution for healthcare reform is the elimination of the health insurance industry.

The history of healthcare reform in the USA has been a history of defeat for reform at the hands of the insurance industry. Labor leadership can serve their members and the American people by adopting a more combative stance toward the insurance industry. It is time to shift tactics from hugs and handshakes to picket lines and demonstrations against the greed and intransigence of the healthcare insurers.

We all  look forward to the day that Pennsylvania AFL-CIO President William George marches at the head of this trend by resigning from the Board of Directors of Highmark Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Pennsylvania and denouncing its opposition to healthcare reform. https://www.highmark.com/hmk2/about/boardofficers/index.shtml

Real healthcare reform as embodied in HR 676, the National Health Care Act, will only be possible when labor closes ranks behind a leadership that fights for healthcare for all. Single payer healthcare will not only provide full coverage for all Americans but will also create 2.6 million new jobs, $343 billion in new revenues, $100 billion in new employee compensation, and $43 billion in new tax revenues. The cost of HR 676 is only 9% of the recent stimulus package and creates the same number of new jobs. Let me repeat, Medicare for All is a stimulus that pays for itself and provides healthcare now and for future generations.

Continue reading SEIU and AFSCME Walk Out on Talks to Cut a Deal with Intransigent Health Insurers →

The White House
Health Care Summit

By Oliver Fein, M.D.

Thanks to many grassroots activists and physicians who called the White House and threatened to demonstrate outside its gates, I was at the Health Care Summit at the White House on March 5 along with Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.). And it was good thing. It meant that the single-payer position was recognized as one pathway to health care reform. It also meant that one of our concerns was present: namely, that any health care reform that includes the for-profit, private health insurance companies will fail to provide universal coverage, will not be able to reduce heath care costs, and will increase the number of underinsured.

It’s important to note that there were others at the summit who are known to be sympathetic to single payer, including some past and present co-sponsors of H.R. 676 and Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont. (More on Sanders below.)

That said, it is true that the summit was carefully choreographed. The opening plenary featured Travis Ulerick, a 24-year-old firefighter from Dublin, Ind., who had sponsored a “health care community discussion” (house party) in his fire station in December. He read off the names of six other people who had hosted similar house parties who had been invited to participate in the summit.

Continue reading Report on White House Health Care Summit by HR 676 Supporter Oliver Fein →

Why Is Single Payer Not Front and Center?

President Obama hosted a White House summit Thursday on reforming healthcare. While President Obama said every idea must be considered, the idea of creating a single-payer national health insurance program appears to have already been rejected. We speak to Harper’s senior editor Luke Mitchell, author of the article “Sick in the Head: Why America Won’t Get the Health-Care System It Needs.”

Listen/Watch/Read:

http://www.democracynow.org/2009/3/6/as_obama_hosts_summit_on_health

Sharpen Your Skills for EFCA Battle

Western PA Unions Set
EFCA Training Session

The Northwest and Southwest Pennsylvania Area Labor Federations are offering a joint training seminar, conducted by Dave Carpio, AFL-CIO Political Department, on speaking to fellow members, constituency groups, allies and the media about the Employee Free Choice Act.

WHEN: Saturday, March 14, 2009
TIME: 9:00 a.m.  ?  Noon
WHERE: IBEW Local 5 (Apprentice Classroom)

5 Hot Metal Street Pittsburgh, PA 15203 Morning Refreshments Free Parking in the lot across from IBEW Local 5.

New Location due to St.  Patrick?s Day Parade in Downtown Pittsburgh For further information and to RSVP contact:

Dave Vinski at 412-562-2428 or swpaalf@verizon.net Jeff Calvin at 724-977-4422 or jlcalvin1@verizon.net