A feasible health care plan

Mr. Margolis implies that the nation can’t afford a Medicare-like system that would cover all Americans, yet the facts would argue otherwise. If one were to add up all the public monies currently spent on health care in the U.S. and applied it across our entire population, on a per capita basis, we already spend more than many industrialized countries do to cover all their citizens.

Support move to universal health care

That’s because we have an enormous parasite on the U.S. health care system: The health insurance industry. Health insurance companies gobble up about 31 cents of every health care dollar. They contribute not one aspirin and not one Band-Aid to anyone’s medical care. They collect premiums and they control who gets care and who does not. I hold them directly responsible for those 18,000 deaths.  Read more 

Will the Gropinator sign it?

A universal health care plan is headed for the governor’s desk again.

The bill by state Sen. Sheila Kuehl, a Santa Monica Democrat, would create a state-financed Medicare-for-all style system to cover all Californians. It cleared the state Assembly on Friday by a 43-31 vote.

The plan would be funded through state and federal appropriations, patient premiums and co-payments limited annually to $250 per person or $500 per family.

How much do you pay in health care premiums? Readers?  Read more 

John Geyman has an excellent post examining all the front groups opposing Medicare for All. Highly recommended.

New Orleans health neglect system post-Katrina.

Skylanda  Read more 

Campaign case report: What Obama and McCain pledge to do about the health system

McCain would end the employee tax exclusion for soundness security against loss spending, instead offering refundable tax credits to help people buy health insurance.

I can’t say it enough, the fate of health care will be determined by the down ballot races.

Democrats’ platform shift on health care

Yet, at the national Platform Drafting Committee meeting in Cleveland at the start of August, the official reception was a bit frosty. When I arrived there early one morning and renewed a longstanding request for a minute or two to make a verbal presentation on behalf of the statement for guaranteed health care, the party’s national platform director informed me candidly: “It’s not going to happen.”

But grassroots organizing continued.  Read more 

JOE BIDEN’S “REALITY” BASED HEALTHCARE

To make the plan less prone to attack from those who fear “socialized” medicine, Biden said, “I don’t want a whole new bureaucracy.”

This is why it is necessary to ALWAYS refer to it as Medicare for All. Because it would require no new bureaucracy to administer, we would just use the present Medicare system. It is Medicare, what we have now, the only difference is that it includes everyone.

The CV Bugle has a good article on the Democratic primary for the first CD in Arizona. The good news is that all but one of the candidates supports Medicare for All.

Private health care system is failing

Being recently unemployed, with a heart condition, I feel that the lack of guaranteed health care, is keeping me from pursuing a business of my own, switching jobs or careers and/or seeking consulting work, simply because I must have health coverage and with my pre-conditions, I am not eligible to obtain it on my own.

Our healthcare neglect system is a powerful incentive for age discrimination.

Have you written a letter to the editor in support of Medicare for All? Remember, it’s not socialized medicine, it’s Medicare for All!

Fifteen days of blogging for health care reform: Unfunded mandates

“You know about EMTALA, right?”  Read more 

Why Uncle Sam is Dr No of healthcare

US health costs are at least twice as high as in countries like France, Britain and Germany with better systems. (Many Americans have an unshakeable belief that these systems are inferior, but no data on longevity or success in handling major diseases supports that prejudice.).

The massive cost disadvantage is a major drag on economic competitiveness.  Read more 

Initiative on health care will be on ballot after all

PHOENIX — Arizonans will get to decide in November whether they want to block the state from imposing a universal health-care program, after all. …

… State House Minority Leader Phil Lopes, D-Tucson, has proposed a universal health-care plan that would pool everything being spent by all parties on health care — including government, business and individuals — to set up a plan under which everyone gets the same basic coverage. Lopes has pegged the cost at close to $35 billion.  Read more 

Via Dizzy Queen at MyDD
McCain’s no care health care

August 21, Saratoga Springs: Health care rally for Capital District

Date : 21 August 2008 From : 11:00am To : 12:00pm
Category : Health / Care Location : 12866

Event Description :

A new coalition of groups called Health Care for America Now! (HCAN) is holding a rally outside the Saratoga Springs Hospital.  Read more 

Geneva hearing tackles universal health care

GENEVA — Tears and cheers rose from the Kane County Government Center Thursday night as citizens and Illinois state representatives gathered to discuss the controversial topic of universal health care.

State Rep. Mary Flowers, D-Chicago, led a citizen hearing to clarify issues surrounding Illinois House Bill 311 and problems with the current health-care system in Illinois.

“We are not for sale,” Flowers said of raising health insurance premiums. “This is about our lives.”  Read more 

Americans need publicly financed, privately delivered health care

‘Healthcare Not Warfare’ at Denver DNC!

Nation needs single-payer health care

Letter: Backs ‘healthy’ candidates  Read more 

Guest post by Skylanda: Fifteen days of blogging for health care reform  Read more 

Proposed Health Care Comparative Effectiveness Research Institute

Declaring that “it’s high time that we built a foundation of evidence for the trillions of dollars spent on health in America each year,” US Democratic Senators Max Baucus and Kent Conrad have introduced legislation to create a Health Care Comparative Effectiveness Research Institute, which would “review evidence and produce new information on how diseases, disorders, and other health conditions can be treated to achieve the best clinical outcome for patients.”  Read more 

$1.5 billion per year

The extensive study of Colorado’s health care system for the legislature’s 208 Commission found that a single-payer system would save Coloradans $1.5 billion per year while covering everyone. America’s unique market-based system (with 47 million uninsured) leaves us paying almost twice as much per capita for our health care as other industrialized nations.
Further, it is patently ridiculous to suggest that with a single-payer system, where coverage is guaranteed, people would still avoid needed health care because of fear of costs.  Read more 

The Observer: American health-care system is ripe for reform

Interestingly, America’s primary health insurer is the federal government. By some estimates, one out of every three Americans (as many as 100 million people) already obtain their health insurance from the federal government. Many of these (e.g., military service personnel and veterans) have a form of universal-single-payer insurance, but most of the rest of us shop in the “free market” for health care.  Read more 

The Grand Junction Free Press publishers an Open Letter to Rep. Udall  Read more 

In his latest column Paul Krugman makes clear, once again, that he does not know the difference between health insurance and health care.

Once again, all together now, WE NEED HEALTHCARE, NOT HEALTH INSURANCE!

Krugman

There’s every reason to believe that a program that extends universal coverage to the nonelderly would soon become equally popular. Consider the case of Massachusetts, which passed a state-level plan for universal coverage two years ago.  Read more 

Consider the case for a national health program

The words “socialized medicine” are like stink bombs. Drop them into a discussion of health care reform, and everyone runs for the door.

So let’s try another phrase. How about “Medicare for all”?

Leon Zoghlin and Peter Mott have been members of Physicians for a National Health Program for decades. And when they talk about reform, they mean Medicare for all. It’s been working well for senior citizens since the 1960s. Why not share the good?  Read more