Category Archives: health care
MAY 13 National Rally at Capitol and Call Your Congressman for Single Payer Healthcare
Groups strategize for single-payer plan
President Barack Obama and Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) rarely pass up a chance to snub single-payer health care — a term that means a government-run system. So opponents on the left who want their voices heard in the debate over health care reform are planning to yell a little bit louder as Congress considers creating a public insurance plan to compete with private insurers.
Their strategy is simple: By pushing hard for single-payer health care, a robust public insurance option ends up looking like a compromise Democrats could accept.
“The best way to get half the pie is ask for the whole pie,” said Katie Robbins, assistant national coordinator of Healthcare-Now, which will not endorse the public plan but acknowledges the strategy. “It is like horse trading.”
Healthcare-Now doesn’t have a seat at the White House negotiating table with other interest groups, including its chief nemesis, the insurance industry. So single-payer advocates have resolved to make their cause hard to ignore. Advocates say that by making the government the sole administrator of health care, the U.S. could save billions of dollars annually on reduced administrative costs.
Single-payer groups earned headlines in March by accusing the White House of excluding them from the first health care forum, and they eventually won seats. Last week, two of those groups — the California Nurses Association and the National Nurses Organizing Committee — launched a Web ad campaign costing in the “low six figures,” targeting the five Democratic committee chairmen writing the health care legislation. On May 13, single-payer advocates will rally at the Capitol.
Missouri IBEW State Conference Endorses HR 676 – Improved Medicare for All
St Louis, Missouri. The Missouri State Conference of Electrical Workers has endorsed HR 676, single payer healthcare legislation introduced by
Congressman John Conyers (D-MI).
The Conference, made up of all 21 IBEW local unions in the state of Missouri, represents more than 21,000 members. The endorsement was voted at the regular quarterly meeting on Jan 13th.
Michael Datillo, President of IBEW Local 1455 who also serves as President of the State Conference, said the resolution was supported by both the members and the Executive Board. Datillo stated: “All unions in this Conference have negotiated healthcare for our members. But the Supreme Court has prevented us from negotiating for retirees and with lay offs and plants closing, we all see the distress the healthcare system is in. Healthcare is a big issue at every negotiation. We are looking for a source for all Americans to have a good healthcare system not just our
members.”
Top Ten Organizations Opposing Improved Medicare for All
The Profiteers of Suffering
The Top 10 Enemies of Single-Payer
To wit, we present the Top Ten Enemies of Single Payer (listed here in alphabetical order):
American Association of Retired Persons (AARP)
AARP, one of DC’s most powerful lobbying groups, has worked inside the beltway for years to defeat single payer. Why? AARP makes about a quarter of its money selling insurance through its affiliate, United Healthcare Group, the nation’s largest for-profit insurance company. AARP must defeat single payer – which if enacted, would wipe out that revenue stream.
American Health Insurance Plans (AHIP)
The private health insurance industry. Public enemy number one. The health insurance corporations must die so that the American people can live. Of course, facing the death penalty, AHIP is the most aggressive opponent to single payer. No compromise with AHIP.
American Medical Association
With a shrinking base of doctors (only 25 percent of doctors nationwide belong) — the AMA is the most conservative of the doctors’ organizations. I just returned from a health care policy forum at the Center for American Progress. As usual, not one of the panelists mentioned single payer. Only during the question period did a self-identified patient/citizen ask the single payer question. And a pit bull-like Nancy Nielsen, president of the AMA, ripped into the questioner. “Sounds more like a statement than a question,” Nielsen said. “And clearly you have a point of view about that. And I don’t happen to share that point of view.” Clearly she doesn’t. But just as clearly, the majority of doctors, probably even a majority of doctors who belong to the AMA, support single payer. Nielsen is in denial and must be defeated.
Continue reading Top Ten Organizations Opposing Improved Medicare for All
Censorship of Medicare for All Is Not Scientific Says Law Professor
by
| Merton Bernstein |
| View Author Bio |
Science does not permit ideology to foreclose inquiry; it requires facing facts and following where they and logic lead. Hence many cheered when President Barack Obama announced that science is back, that predisposition will no longer be permitted to trump reality. Everyone knew he was talking about stem cell research.
Who could have guessed that the Obama administration and key congressional players would exclude single-payer/Medicare-for-all programs from consideration even though that means ignoring the cost savings of hundreds of billions of dollars in private plans’ nonbenefit costs? Further, administration health experts advertise their focus on avoiding incentives for unnecessary treatment, but pay no mind to the expensive distortions that follow from physicians’ ownership interests in high-cost equipment and services. Odd that the scientific method does not apply to medical care where science should govern.
Continue reading Censorship of Medicare for All Is Not Scientific Says Law Professor
Single Payer Testimony Before Congress by Dr. Himmelstein
Testimony of David U. Himmelstein, M.D.
Before the HELP Subcommittee April 23, 2009
Mr. Chairman, members of the Committee. My name is David Himmelstein. I am a primary care doctor in Cambridge, Massachusetts and Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard. I also serve as National Spokesperson for Physicians for a National Health Program. Our 15,000 physician members support non-profit, single payer national health insurance because of overwhelming evidence that lesser reforms will fail.
Health reform must address the cost crisis for insured as well as uninsured Americans.
Continue reading Single Payer Testimony Before Congress by Dr. Himmelstein
The Massachusetts’ Plan: A Failed Model for Health Care Reform
A new study shows that the Massachusetts model for national healthcare reform is a failure. Taxpayer subsidized insurance and forcing citizens to buy insurance is supported by the insurance industry and their bought politicians such as US Sen. Max Baucus.
The Massachusetts Reform:
A Rerun of Past State Reforms That Have Failed
Back in 1988, Massachusetts passed a universal health care law very similar to the 2006 reform. Since 1988, many states—Oregon, Minnesota Tennessee, Vermont, Washington and Maine—have enacted reforms aimed at achieving universal coverage. All failed.
These reforms differed in detail, but shared common elements. All offered new public subsidies or expanded Medicaid for poor and near-poor people. All left the majority of private health insurance arrangements undisturbed, although many included new insurance regulations or state purchasing pools to help make affordable coverage available to individuals or small businesses. Some (Massachusetts 1988, Oregon 1992, Washington State 1993) contained mandates on employers or self-employed individuals.
None of these reforms made more than a temporary dent in the number of uninsured. These incremental reforms failed because they did not include effective cost-control measures. As health costs rose, legislatures backed off from forcing employers and the self-employed from paying ever-rising premiums and the mandates were repealed. Relying on Medicaid was fiscally problematic for states because tax revenues fall at the same time that unemployment pushes families out of private coverage. There is little reason to think that the current Massachusetts reform, or a national plan modeled on these state reforms, would have any better long-term success.
Is there an alternative to this model?
Yes. A bill in Congress, the United States National Health Care Act, H.R. 676 (also known as “The Expanded and Improved Medicare for All Act”) would implement single-payer financing of health care while maintaining the private delivery system. A single-payer program would eliminate private insurers and use the administrative savings to provide comprehensive coverage for all. Features of the single-payer plan include:
- Comprehensive coverage for all, including doctor, hospital, long-term, mental health, dental and vision care as well as prescription drugs and medical supplies.
- No premiums, co-payments, or deductibles that inhibit access to care and unfairly burden the poor.
- Free choice of doctor and hospital and an end to insurance company and HMO dictates over patient care.
- Pays for itself by eliminating wasteful private insurance administration and profit. A progressive tax would replace what is currently paid out-of-pocket.
- Controls costs so benefits are sustainable through negotiated physician fees, global budgets for hospitals and bulk purchasing of prescription drugs and medical supplies. A single-payer system would facilitate health planning to reestablish the balance between preventive and primary care on one hand, and high-tech tertiary care on the other.
The nation must not look to Massachusetts’ health reform as a model. If we truly want to provide comprehensive health care for all of us at a price we can afford, we must adopt a single-payer plan.
Read the complete analysis here: http://www.citizen.org/hrg/articles.cfm?ID=18395
SW Alabama Labor Council and CWA Local 3372 in Lexington, KY Endorse HR 676
Mobile, Alabama. The Southwest Alabama Labor Council has endorsed HR 676, single payer healthcare legislation introduced by Congressman John Conyers (D-MI).
The Alabama Labor Council is the one hundred-and-twenty-first labor council to endorse the Conyers legislation. The resolution was forwarded to the members of congress who represent Mobile and surrounding areas.
In Lexington, Kentucky, CWA Local 3372 has also endorsed the Conyers legislation, reports Local President Joseph McCarty. The resolution was sent to Representative Ben Chandler.
Demand for Single Payer Healthcare Heard Inside and Outside Burlington Forum
- Single Payer Rally at Burlington Healthcare Forum
Burlington Free Press
March 18, 2009
Single-payer health care system touted
150 rally in support of concept at regional forum at UVM
By Nancy Remsen, Free Press Staff Writer
Dr. John Walsh, a neuroscience researcher from Worcester, Mass., stood Tuesday with 150 other sign-carrying supporters of government-financed health care outside the building where 400 invited guests would attend a regional health care reform forum sponsored by the Obama White House.
Walsh passed out yellow fliers that denounced President Barack Obama for failing to live up to promises to consider a Canadian-style health insurance system. “Single payer is the choice in the polls,” Walsh declared.
Sandy Eaton of Quincy, Mass., and a member of the Massachusetts Nurses Association, came to the only forum scheduled for the Northeast to add his voice to those demanding that national policymakers weigh the merits of a government-financed system when they discuss reform options. “Let’s make sure there is a fair and legitimate comparison,” Eaton said.
Rebecca Elgie, a retired teacher, traveled six hours from Ithaca, N.Y., because she has made advocacy for a single-payer system her cause. Three years ago she walked 400 miles across her state to raise awareness about the need for a better way to pay for health care. Elgie said, “The employee-based system has outlived its usefulness.”
The rally greeted the invited guests as they strolled toward the Davis Center at the University of Vermont under a bright blue sky. “They need to know there is enough support for people to drop everything and come here to support single payer,” said Dr. Deb Richter, a Montpelier family physician and prime force in the single-payer movement in Vermont.
Continue reading Demand for Single Payer Healthcare Heard Inside and Outside Burlington Forum
Beaver County Blue: Voice of the 17th CD of Progressive Democrats of America 