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States May Lead the Way on Health Care Reform |
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This is a cross-post from the Daily Kos blog.
In Canada, it took the dogged determination of one province, Saskatchewan, and a visionary leader, Tommy Douglas, to pave the path to a national health care system, which they call Medicare.
For all the detractors of the Canadian system in the studios of Fox News and the board rooms of right wing think tanks, consider this one note: In 2004, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation conducted a national poll to select the greatest Canadian of all time. The winner in a landslide—Tommy Douglas.
While the federal window remains open for reform, with two national single payer bills, John Conyers’ H.R. 676 in the House and now Bernie Sanders’ S. 703 in the Senate, many nurses, doctors, and health activists are turning to the states to lead as well.
It’s worth recalling that Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis famously called states “the laboratories of democracy.” As columnist Froma Harrop has suggested, “being closer to the people and more attuned to the local culture, states are better equipped than the federal government to introduce new social policies. Innovations are usually first tried in the places most receptive to them.”
More than a half dozen U.S. states now are considering legislation to establish single payer systems, essentially an expanded and updated form of the U.S. Medicare system to cover everyone in their states. Here’s a roundup of some of the state bills:
California
The latest bill S.B. 810 passed its first legislative test Wednesday in the Senate Health Committee on a party line 7-4 vote before a room packed with nurses, doctors, medical students, California School Employees Association members, and healthcare activists.
In her lead testimony, Malinda Markowitz, RN, co-president of the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee noted that “nurses know insurance companies don’t provide any value whatsoever in the delivery of medicine. Under S.B. 810, we would be free of their interference, their denial of care, their massive bureaucracy, and their waste of healthcare dollars.”
UC Irvine medical student Parker Duncan said that he did not want to “be in a world not doing what I was trained to do,” referring to the paperwork that is one of the expensive burdens that undermine the ability.
Twice this decade California’s legislature passed earlier versions of S.B. 810 (S.B. 840 carried by now retired Sen. Sheila Kuehl), but the bills were vetoed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. State activists say they will continue to push single payer in California, even if they need to wait until the next governor, who won’t be Schwarzenegger, is elected in 2010.
Colorado
House Bill 1273 by Fort Collins Democrat John Kefalas, passed its first vote in the state House April 6. The bill sets up a 23-member commission to design a universal health-insurance system.
“Our current health-care system is not well,” Kefalas said. “Our current health-care system is unsustainable, with the cost of health care and the numbers of the uninsured rising dramatically.”
Press reports note a state Blue Ribbon Commission on Health Care Reform two years ago studied single payer and found it was the only approach that saved money compared to what Coloradans now spend on healthcare.
Illinois
H.B. 311, the Healthcare for All Illinois Act, sponsored by Rep. Mary Flowers, had its first hearing in March. Though no votes have been taken yet, the new Gov. Pat Quinn is a longtime supporter of single payer reform.
At an introductory press conference, Brenda Langford, Cook County RN, said that “Illinois can once again be a symbol of hope and progress for our nation. Nurses are tired of watching our patients suffer from denial of care and lack of access to coverage. We see far too much of this at Cook County hospitals—and that’s why we support guaranteed healthcare through a single-payer system.”
Maine
L.D. 1365, sponsored by Brunswick Rep. Charles Priest, and co-sponsored from legislators from all over the state, had its first hearing April 13.
The hearing came just days after both houses of the Maine legislature passed resolutions calling on President Obama and Congress to enact federal single payer legislation. A poll this winter showed 52 percent of Maine physicians also favor single payer.
As Cathy Herlihy of the Maine State Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee put it in a state forum featuring U.S. Senator Olympia Snowe, a single-payer system is the “the only solution,” she said. “We do not have time to wait. Our health should not be sacrificed for limited reforms.”
Pennsylvania
Two single payer bills are alive in the state, House Bill 1660, the “Family and Business Healthcare Security Act of 2009,” and Senate Bill 300.
Gov. Ed Rendell has said that if a single payer bill were to make it to his desk, he will sign it, reports Chuck Pennachio of Health Care for All Pennsylvania.
The state Democratic House Caucus is holding a public forum on the bill Friday, April 17, at 10 a.m. at the University of Pennsylvania campus in Philadelphia, featuring speakers from Physicians for a National Health Program, the Pennsylvania Association of Staff Nurses and Allied Professionals, and other single payer supporters.
The hearing comes on the heels of a resolution passed by the Philadelphia City Council calling for both state and federal lawmakers to establish a single-payer health system.
Other States
Single payer bills are also on the docket in Minnesota, Missouri, and Washington.
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When Arnold goes away, maybe we can get healthcare reform in Ca. I will certainly support it. The HMOs and insurance companies will be out of business and we can use that and the Medicare/Medical monies to fund it. And probably make it cheaper in the long run. Doctors and hospitals should be paid to help keep us well, not just to cure what ails us. Then perhaps, it will NOT ail us.
I am for universal healthcare. It can be paid for with the money we are now paying to insurance companies, HMOs, Medicare, Medical, the indigent program and serving outpatients in the ER. We should have walk-in clinics where people can be treated 24 hrs a day without tieing up ERs, where more serious real emergencies can then be treated in a more efficient manner. If people are treated before they become so sick that more drastic measures need to be taken, health care will be cheaper than with the present system. You could still have co-pays, but those could be commensurate with your income. That way, no one, especially a child, would die of poverty.
For a take on how Sebelius might fare as Director of HHS, see this story about her “success” in getting the regressives in Kansas to do anything substantive on health care reform. A commission created by the legislature called the Kansas Health Policy Authority made about two dozen recommendations, one of which included single-payer. It was one of two recommendations that covered everyone and, of course, cost less money. It wasn’t even considered by the legislature. Of the 21 that it did consider, most were rejected, including such public health no-brainers as an increase in tobacco taxes and a statewide smoking ban.
http://www.pitch.com/2009-04-09/news/as-kathleen-sebelius-leaves-to-help-barack-obama-reform-health-care-in-washington-here-s-a-checkup-on-what-happened-in-kansas/
Our Governor of Illinois, is proposing that state employees and retirees pay an additional $200 million in health insurance costs. Increases for a single employee would increase from $90 a month to $310 a month. Many retirees who do not qualify for Medicare ( usually long term service employees hired before 1986) would see monthly premiums go to $580 per month.
Meanwhile, he continues to expand Medicaid to the tune of $14. 2 billion for FY10. It should also be noted that in FY 08 $4.9 of the $12.7 billion Medicaid budget was used to pay for OPTIONAL services not requirted by the fderal govt. regs. That’s right, NOT REQUIRED to the tune of $4.9 billion. No deductibles or ANY insurance premiums for these recipients. Just FREE.
But he continues to use the is using the state employees as a whipping boy in the budgetary process.
Also wants to increase pension contributions from 8% to 10% after decades fo the state vastly underfunding the system as they were supposed to. Again, using state employees as the stooges in this fiscal mess.
He is no friend of state workers or labor. And any pious statements he has about health care should not be taken seriously.
Ready to debate him any time.
Frank Goudy
SEIU 1974-1977
AFT 1977-2005