Single Payer Defined in South Carolina

Stories from the Road Show
Can Anyone (any viable candidate, that is) say Single-Payer?
By BRAD WARTHEN - Editorial Page Editor

 
CAN ANYONE among those with a chance of becoming president say "single-payer?" If not, forget about serious reform of the way we pay for health care.

It doesn't even necessarily have to be "single-payer." Any other words will do, as long as the plan they describe is equally bold, practical, understandable, and goes as far in uprooting our current impractical, wasteful and insanely complex "system."

And the operative word is "bold." Why? Because unless we start the conversation there, all we might hope for is that a few more of the one out of seven Americans who don't have insurance will be in the "system" with the rest of us — if that, after the inevitable watering-down by Congress. And that's not "reform." Actual reform would rescue all of us from a "system" that neither American workers nor American employers can afford to keep propping up.

But the operative word to describe the health care plans put forward by the major, viable candidates is "timid."

"Single-payer" is definitely not that — at least, not within an American context. Seen from the perspective of most advanced nations — which accept medical care as just another part of a nation's infrastructure, like roads and post offices — it's no big deal.

Not here, though — not by a long shot. Here, we have too many people preprogrammed to go ballistic at the mention of "single-payer." That's because of the identity of that payer.

It's... well, it's the government!

This column will now take a short break while libertarians run around shrieking until they turn blue and fall over... da-da-dum-dum, hmmm... readers might want to go look at the Sunday comics until we resume... da-dee-da-dahhh... Still screaming, so let's get another cup of coffee... Ah, that's good stuff...

OK, we're back, and they're still screaming, but we'll just have to accept that they're going to do that, and proceed.

"Government," in America, is a word that we use for a free people banding together to do something that we can do far better working together than working separately. Some people don't accept that fact. They seem to believe that "government" is some scary thing that intrudes on their lives from out there somewhere, like a spaceship full of aliens with ray guns that will turn us all into toads or something.

Those people are one of the two big reasons why you don't hear any presidential candidates saying "single-payer" except Dennis Kucinich. You may recall recent reports that Mr. Kucinich had a close encounter with a UFO, and it was a positive experience, so I guess he's just not scared of the aliens any more.

But the major candidates are. Or rather, they're scared of being labeled as extremists. Also, they don't want to offend the health insurance companies whose reason for being would disappear under "single-payer."

Last week, I got a press release from a labor union that complained "that no Republican candidate has a plan to ensure all Americans have access to health care." That's true. But the union, which represents blue- and pink-collar workers in health care, was missing the fact that the leading Democrats are little better.

"Sens. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have been engaged in a bitter back-and-forth over whose health plan covers more people," The Wall Street Journal reported last week. "Former Sen. John Edwards has jumped in, saying his plan is the best of all."

But what they're fighting over are plans that would pull varying numbers of the uninsured into the same overly expensive, wasteful, maddening system of private health insurance that the rest of us are caught in. Conveniently, they say their plans would be paid for by repealing the "Bush tax cuts for the wealthy."

Maybe you could pay for a health plan that way — as long as it doesn't provide real reform.

Make no mistake: A single-payer national health plan would cost a lot of money, and you would pay for it in new taxes. The good news is that most of us would probably still pay less than we currently pay in premiums.

According to the Web site of Physicians for a National Health Program, which promotes single-payer, "This is because private insurance bureaucracy and paperwork consume one-third (31 percent) of every health care dollar. Streamlining payment through a single nonprofit payer would save more than $350 billion per year, enough to provide comprehensive, high-quality coverage for all Americans."

But when not even touchy-feely liberal Democrats have the guts to say it's worth paying a new tax to make health care affordable for all, even when that's the hottest domestic issue among voters (which would not be the case if the insured majority were happy), we're in trouble.

Little wonder that Dow Jones' MarketWatch reported last week that "Those who hope the 2008 presidential election will finally bring about drastic health-care reform may well end up finding it's a case of politics and business as usual, experts say." The same article noted that Hillary Clinton has received $1.8 million in contributions from accident and health insurers, followed by Barack Obama with $1.45 million, Mitt Romney with $1.09 million and Rudy Giuliani with $1.08 million.

That, by the way, is money that you and I and the guy down the street paid for health care that didn't go to health care.

Given the odds against substantive reform — between the government haters, the insurance industry and Big Pharma, all of whom have a demonstrated willingness to outlast the rest of us in any protracted political fight — the only way we're going to see significant change is if a president is elected with a mandate for bold reform. Only a president is elected by the whole nation, so only a president would ever have that kind of juice. Unfortunately, as previously noted, none of the viable candidates will say "single-payer."

But I will: "Single-payer. Single-payer, single-payer! Now, do you have anything better to say?"

Make Universal Health Care a Key Part of the Electoral Struggle
By Healthcare-NOW
To People all over the Country Demanding Healthcare for All:

Last week in Chicago, more than 100 Healthcare-NOW activists came together to plan our strategy for quality single payer, guaranteed choice, national healthcare during the coming year. We also launched our first SiCKO-Cure Road Show.

We agreed that our mission is to by-pass all of the incremental compromise plans being proposed that allow the insurance companies to continue killing people. American Patients for Universal Health Care revealed statistics that 282,600 U.S. patients have died since the beginning of the Iraq War as a result of insurance denials.

We all know that we are in a major healthcare crisis – that the crisis of the “uninsured” is only the tip of the iceberg. The truth is that people who think they have good insurance are dying too since the insurance companies cancel and reject and deny even people who have been buying their product for decades. And their salaries and profits continue to rise because the more people they deny, the more money they make. Most people without insurance are people with jobs, striving to make ends meet…many of them making good middle class salaries that don’t stretch to cover health insurance. And many of these are young people who don’t expect to ever have a job that will cover their healthcare needs.

So, what are we getting from all of the major candidates in the Republican and Democratic Parties? The most promoted proposal, supported by both former governor Mitt Romney, a leading Republican, and Senator Hillary Clinton, a leading Democrat, is the “individual mandate,” a plan that would force all of us to purchase health insurance from the insurance companies – further enriching them and allowing them to continue controlling our system, providing inadequate plans, raising premiums, charging co-pays and deductibles, and denying us healthcare.

Why don’t the candidates get it? Why can’t they see that we do not want the insurance corporations and their rich lobbyists to continue controlling our healthcare system? We want a single payer system that WE control as a part of a public responsibility.

In our Chicago meeting of healthcare leaders, our business coalition for single payer noted that in meetings with insurance executives, they have learned that these entrepreneurs are determined to stay in the game and continue to haul away billions of our healthcare dollars (one third of the whole healthcare budget goes into their pockets for administration and profits) as long as they possibly can. Even though they know that the system in the United States is going to change because of our demand, they plan to stay in control and rake in the dough as long as possible.

We know they are powerful. They are able to resist every attempt to regulate them or remove them. They have more than one well-paid lobbyist for every single Member of Congress.

Unfortunately, none of the “media-chosen” front-runners is willing or able to commit to removing the insurance companies so far. Everyone on this Healthcare-NOW mailing list should investigate these candidates. Ask the real questions. Who are their contributors? Where is their loyalty? Bird-dog them. Ask them to commit to a single payer system. Ask them to reject insurance and drug company financing. Some of them expect us to believe the promise that (when they are elected) they are going to heavily regulate the insurance industry. Give me a break! They have never been heavily regulated and they never will be. They must be exposed and ejected.

How many more thousands have to die as a result of insurance denials and rejections before we get the change we need?

Let’s get a system that is not based on denying healthcare procedures to the people who need them in order to increase profits.

What is your job and my job now? Elect Progressive candidates to Congress – Pro-single payer candidates throughout the nation! That’s what we need. Candidates who care about what we think about healthcare and the health of our country and our world. NOW is the time to make it happen – not sometime next year when you realize you don’t have a viable candidate. Find new candidates if you don’t have one in your district, Get ready to help elect them and hold them accountable.

Our national Sicko-Cure Road Show is on the trail right now. We are visiting 22 Congressional Districts and 11 States. Go to our website to read the story. And get ready to join us on more Road Shows into other Districts next year. Who wants to go to New Hampshire in January? Thanks to support from our co-sponsors, the California Nurses Association and the Physicians for a National Health Program, the Steelworkers and hundreds of local groups, this strategy is working and building support for HR 676.

Next year, we will be joining with these groups and others to expose the Massachusetts “individual mandates” requiring/forcing everybody to purchase insurance from insurance companies or pay a hefty fine. Maybe it will be a Boston tea party. We are discussing a Road Show down from Massachusetts to Washington, D.C. culminating in a National Memorial for the 282,600 people who have been killed by insurance company denials. What do you think of this idea?

We need you to be a part of us at every step on this journey. You’ve helped to build a huge movement for a national healthcare system. Now we must redouble our efforts to challenge the privatizers and keep them from sabotaging that movement. Go to our website to learn more. AND Join Healthcare-NOW. www.healthcare-now.org

Terra Haute, Indiana, November 13th: 

The bus campaign’s creators say it is aimed at educating Americans in 11 states about the comprehensive, cost-effective solution to the current health insurance crisis, the U.S. National Health Insurance Act (HR 676).

Local Healthcare-NOW! members will meet with Rep. Brad Ellsworth’s staff at 2 p.m. at the congressman’s Terre Haute office. At 7 p.m., a free screening of Michael Moore’s film, “SiCKO,” will be in Room 103 of Holmstedt Hall on the Indiana State University campus.

The educational bus tour begins in Chicago and ends in New Orleans. Its organizers say the country’s health care crisis has hit Indiana particularly hard.

According to Hoosiers for a Commonsense Health Plan, Indiana has the highest per capita rate of medically-bankrupt families, more than 77,000 Hoosiers. And surprisingly, 75 percent of those declaring bankruptcy for medical reasons had health insurance when they got sick.

Jessica Livingston of the local Healthcare-NOW! chapter said the group will ask Ellsworth to join the current 86 co-sponsors of HR 676 “because it is the only way to truly fix the problems with our health care system crisis. Every other industrialized country in the world has guaranteed health care for everyone — why don’t we?”

After the screening at Holmstedt, members of the Road Show team will discuss the movie and the bill. Members include Donna Smith, who is featured with her husband in a health care “horror” story in “SiCKO.”

 Indiana
Kay Kass Stone
Times Correspondent | Tuesday, November 13, 2007
GARY | The Healthcare-NOW tour to promote a universal health care system in America rolled into the region Monday night.

Northwest Indiana was the first stop of the tour as it set off from Chicago. It will zigzag across the eastern half of the United States promoting House Resolution 676, the U.S. National Health Insurance Act.

The bill calls for a single-payer universal health care system for the country. It is a system by which the health care expenditures of an entire population are paid for through one source -- the federal government or a subcontracting entity -- using tax revenue from individuals and employers, according to the National Heath Care for the Homeless Council.

HR 676 currently has the support of 86 congressmen in the House. The Healthcare-NOW tour is targeting congressional districts whose congressmen are not currently supporting the bill.

The tour stopped in Northwest Indiana because U.S Rep. Pete Visclosky, D-Ind., is not one of the 86 members of the House supporting the bill.

Healthcare-NOW coordinator Marilyn Clement and United Steelworkers District 7's Steelworkers Organization of Active Retirees executive board member Stephen Skvara met with Mark Lopez, a representative of Visclosky's office to discuss the issue of national health care.

After the meeting with Lopez, Clement and Skvara joined other members of the tour at District 7's McBride Hall in Gary.

Clement and Skvara hope Visclosky will support the bill.

"We need a universal health care bill, and we need an additional 14 more members of Congress to make our goal of 100 by the end of the year, and I think (Visclosky) should be one of the 100," Clement said.

On The Road Again:  The SiCKO Cure Road Show
By Donna Smith
NASHVILLE -- We've been on the health care road show for five days now, and we're finding this road full of interesting souls,from Chicago to Nashville . In a 1980 school bus painted with bold black lettering announcing our single-payer, universal health care movement, we've been making our way from city to city spreading the best news of this holiday season:  We can fix our health care mess and bring a message of hope to those Americans who think the system is too far gone.

I began this adventure while still on my hunger strike for the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), but within a short time of joining in a conference with other caring folks working on health care, some of my most trusted friends and associates in this effort convinced me that my continued fasting was not going to be noticed or cared about by the Congressional members who needed to put the real effort into the program.  So on the very first day of the road show, I broke my fast and began eating protein first and then juices.  My stomach screamed as I left Chicago .  Even the 10 days without food changes the body's ability to digest food, so I am still readjusting to food.

Friends said if Congress didn't care enough about sick and dying kids to act, why would they care about a few moms hunger striking for health care?  It was a point I could not deny.  And I keep thinking about the 2,300 Americans who will die in the weeks while Congress breaks for the holidays.  Those people will die because they didn't have access to health care in arguably the richest and most powerful nation on earth.  So we keep going on the road show bus.

 The five people on the bus are as diverse as their histories and cultures might suggest but we all believe in a health care system with the simple message: "Everybody in, nobody out."  And so far we've only had one person tape a little hand made note on the side of the bus that read: "Socialism."  The note was quite colorful, and we kept it aboard for the ride to remind us of all misinformation and myths we have to overcome as we take the message deeper into the south and across the nation.

 Many of the folks I've met in Indiana and Kentucky so far have amazed me with their grasp of what needs to be done to fix our health care system.  But through the real bonding we have done with average Americans from place to place, I've once again learned how much more alike we all are than we sometimes think.  And we all need health care.

We've had great fun and some challenges meeting with the Congressional office staffs in four separate districts so far.  But even in those meetings it becomes painfully clear to me that many of our elected officials just are not living in the same world the rest of us are -- worried about our health care futures and frustrated that the people who could change that reality for us have not done so. There is a smug disregard for the people who so need their leadership, and many are protecting their political futures in an election year rather than risking standing together with the American people.

We've laughed about our bus with only half of its original seats and heat that doesn't quite make it all the way through the whole bus.  When we stop to eat we talk with waitresses and others who will listen and we often leave printed information behind so the local people can get involved after the SiCKO road show bus leaves town.

 So on we go... to more adventure in the heart of America . I suspect we'll have much to be thankful for in a few days when we share our holiday with complete strangers who are our American family members who join us in the need for a health care system that heals and helps.

 Sicko Cure Road Show Puts Health Care in the Spotlight
Roman Lillie
WCTV
Posted: 6:12 PM Nov 28, 2007

The Sicko Cure Road show was in Tallahassee on Wednesday, telling people about what they say are the benefits of guaranteed health care.

The Road Show is traveling across the country to try and pass a bill that would provide free health care for every American. With more than forty-six million Americans without health insurance many people are hoping for a change.

And some who have insurance worry that premiums are getting higher.

Jimmy Harris, a resident of Quincy says, “I kind of feel like they’re a little higher than what I’d like to pay. I can manage but it takes a little better planning.”

Rabbi Jack Romberg adds, “Is it just that middle class families that only ten years ago or eight years ago could easily afford health insurance, struggle to insure themselves and their children. Not only is that not just, it is immoral.”

One doctor worries that with our current health care system, doctors are sometimes too preoccupied to give patients the care they deserve.

Byron Tucker, MD warns, “The financing issues and trying to figure out what the patient can or can not afford. They don’t spend time directly dealing with medical problems.”

Participants at the Sicko Cure Road Show believe they have the solution. They’re backing Congressional bill HR 676. Under that bill, government sponsored health care would be available to everyone.

Barbara DeVane of the Florida Alliance for Retired Americans says the plan would be an extension of Medicare. “This would extend Medicare to everyone now; you don’t get Medicare until you turn 65. With H-R- 676, you would get health care from the womb to the tomb”

Organizers met with Congressman Allen Boyd earlier in the day in the hopes of getting support for this bill.

Supporters of government funded health care not that, many European countries already have government funde

Rocky Mount, North Carolina
SiCKO Cure Road Show gathers with workers in Rocky Mount
By Donna Smith, American SiCKO

The road show team of the SiCKO Cure National Road Show rolled into Rocky Mount on Sunday afternoon and met with 20 committed members of the Black Workers for Justice local.
 
Though none of North Carolina's Congressional members is currently signed on H.R.676, Rep. John Conyers' National Health Insurance Act, those gathered in the local worker hall committed themselves to a future screening of 'SiCKO' and to forming a working group to address political action and to assist local people with health care issues and concerns with current programs.
 
When the road show crew from Healthcare-Now rolls into a community, it isn't as if one of the current presidential candidates has arrived with a flashy and spirited entourage.  The crew brings news of the possibilities for organizing local support for pushing Congressional members for their co-sponsorship, and the road show builds on community and shared vision not celebrity or the political winds of a primary election season.
 
An interesting commonality in the communities visited from Illinois in mid-November, through Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, and finally North Carolina has been the solidarity of common people who understand the inherent injustice of the current health care system in the U.S.
 
As the road shows winds its way toward the final stop on its first regional sweep, the priorities of the American people seem much more inclusive and united than any team member might have imagined.  Left behind are groups of leaders and fighters who vow to carry on the push for H.R.676, single-payer, universal health care for all.

Greenleaf pastor rocks SiCKO Cure Road Show

Road Show Tour Visits Columbia, (South Carolina) to Push Health Care for All
National Insurance Act at Center of Event  BY DANIEL TERRILL
The Sicko-Cure Road Show, which has been traveling the nation to promote universal health care, visited Columbia on Dec. 3-4, stopping at the State House, Benedict College and USC as part of a 33-day tour that began Nov. 11.

Organized by the nonprofit Healthcare-NOW, a nationwide grassroots group based in New York City, the road show visits the districts of members of Congress who have yet to sign onto H.R. 676.

Called the National Insurance Act, the bill would establish a single-payer national health care system. U.S. Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., introduced the bill Jan. 24.

U.S. House Majority Whip James Clyburn, a Democrat whose district includes part of Richland County, is one of the members in the road show’s sights.

Rolling in a school bus partly painted red and bearing the Healthcare-Now name, the tour also aims to educate the public about H.R. 676.

“Everybody would pay something into the national health care fund — on a sliding scale — depending on their income,” the Healthcare-NOW web site says. “But they would no longer receive health care bills. They would no longer pay co-pays and deductibles; they would no longer be denied prevention [care], a doctor of their choice, and care when they need it.”

Individual and employer medical costs would decrease substantially, netting $286 billion in savings nationally per year, and the system would be privately administered by doctors, according to Healthcare-NOW. “No insurance company profits will be needed and drug company profits will be limited to a reasonable amount by mass purchasing.”

So far H.R. 676 has 87 sponsors, Healthcare-NOW spokeswoman Elyse Seigle says. “We’re hoping by the end of this congressional period we can have that number well over the 218 that we need to send this bill to vote,” Seigle says.

In an email, (Congressman) Clyburn says the nation faces a health care crisis and it’s past time for Congress to act. “I strongly believe universal health care,” Clyburn says. “That’s why I’ve worked hard on legislation that will be a first step towards health coverage for all Americans — an expansion of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program, which covers 10 million children.”

Several bills pending in the U.S. House, Congress, including H.R. 676, could solve the health care crisis, he says, adding, “I commend the advocacy groups for their efforts to advance this issue in South Carolina and across the nation.”

In South Carolina, 850,000 people lack health insurance, says Sabra Smith, a registered nurse and spokeswoman for South Carolinians for Universal Health Care. “When faced with too many financial burdens and no health insurance to cover their bill, patients often ignore their conditions, don’t fill prescriptions and they return to the cycle of emergency department visits and hospitalizations,” Smith says.

Liv Boykin, a former Conyers staff member who was on the road show in Columbia, said that under a universal health care program, “the first question you will be asked is what is wrong with you? How can I help you? Not what kind of insurance do you have?”


Group urges Cramer to sponsor health bill
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
By STEVE DOYLE
Times Staff Writer steve.doyle@htimes.com

Demonstrators push for national insurance act

Sign-waving demonstrators who want Congress to pass a universal health insurance bill rallied Tuesday outside U.S. Rep. Bud Cramer's Huntsville office.

Reese Danley-Kilgo, one of the organizers, said the group is asking Cramer, a Democrat, to co-sponsor the "United States National Health Insurance Act." It would create a publicly financed, privately delivered health care system to cover necessary medical care for every American, without co-payments or deductibles.

"It would leave out insurance companies and pharmaceutical corporations and just be an arrangement between the people who need health care and all the rest of us in the country," said Danley-Kilgo, a retired University of Alabama in Huntsville professor.

She and other demonstrators met with Cramer's district director, Jim McCamy, at the National Children's Advocacy Center on Pratt Avenue, where Cramer has an office. They gave McCamy information about the bill, plus a petition signed by about 50 people and a copy of "Sicko," controversial filmmaker Michael Moore's documentary about America's health care system.

McCamy did not immediately return a call from The Times.

"We'll be going back" to Cramer's office, said Danley-Kilgo, a member of the North Alabama Peace Network. "Part of the strategy is letting him know there are people who are very eager to get this bill co-sponsored and passed. It's long, long overdue."

    
'Sickos' take their show on the road
Friday, November 23, 2007
Lolis Eric Elie

In those months after the levees failed, many of our bodies failed as well.

Diabetes, high blood pressure and arthritis that had been tamed by diet, exercise or medication, suddenly got off leash and ran amok. Depression soared as hopes for a quick, safe return home died.

Stranded in Texas or Georgia or Arizona, many of us learned the cold geography of health insurance. Depending on where you were, what kind of coverage you had and what kind of ache pained you, your health insurance might or might not help you get well.

Among the many post-Hurricane Katrina lessons the people of the Gulf Coast can teach the nation, we must be sure to include this one: our country needs health insurance that is portable enough to allow Americans traveling in any of this nation's states or territories to receive quality health care, no nonmedical questions asked.

Shocking movie

That is the sort of medical care that Healthcare-NOW envisions.

That group has helped to organize the Sicko-Cure Road Show to drum up support for a national health insurance program that would provide coverage for all needed medical care without copayments or deductibles.

A key component of the tour is the screening of Michael Moore's documentary, "Sicko," a stark and humorous portrayal of our ailing health care system.

In that film, Americans who are unable to afford health care are cast into bankruptcy and forced to choose which finger to keep and which one to do without. Health insurance professionals tell shocking tales of earning financial bonuses by denying needed health care to patients who are destined to die if they don't receive treatment.

Coming to town

The Sicko-Cure Road Show hits Louisiana starting Saturday.

Supporters are hoping to convince our representatives in Congress to support H.R. 676, a bill before Congress also known as the Expanded and Improved Medicare for All bill. Rep. William Jefferson, D-New Orleans, is the only Louisiana official listed as a supporter of the bill.

So much of our national mythology is tangled up with the idea that the free market cures all ills that it is difficult to have any serious discussion of other approaches to our most pressing problems.

But we in Louisiana see the deficiencies of free markets in ways we might have been unable to imagine three years ago.

If ever there was a time for us to help lead our nation into a radical new direction, this is it.

The SICKO-Cure Road Show will begin with a discussion of the proposed demolition of New Orleans public housing at 11 a.m. on Saturday at the Loyola University Law School at 526 Pine St. "Sicko" will be screened for free at 7 p.m. at the Ashé Cultural Center, 1712 Oretha Castle Haley Blvd. Sunday, the road show travels to Baton Rouge before returning to the Lower 9th Ward Health Clinic on Monday.


'SiCKO' in the US - Donna Smith, a cast member of the movie "SiCKO" and founder of American Patients for Universal Healthcare, leads a discussion about health care in the United States Tuesday night.
Students, faculty discuss current health care situation
By: Aliya Khan
Posted: 11/14/07

Angi Borchelt, a freshman life sciences major, discovered not only a movie Tuesday night at the screening of SiCKO; she discovered a cause.

"I had heard of SiCKO, but I didn't really know what it was about," Borchelt said. "This is something that is very important to me and I want to get involved."

"SiCKO," a Michael Moore documentary about the lack of universal health care in the United States, was screened in part of the SiCKO-Cure Road Show, hosted by members of the local Healthcare-NOW! Coalition. Local leaders met earlier Tuesday with members of Congressman Brad Ellsworth's staff at the congressman's Terre Haute office.

After the film, Donna Smith, a victim featured in the film "SiCKO," talked to attendees about the dilemma and getting involved.

"I think it is critical to act now," Smith said. "The younger generation needs to anticipate this before their generation gets marred by the health care costs. I think it is easy when you are in your 20s to believe that this will never happen to you. You need to build a better world for you, your family, your friends and your future children."

The SiCKO-Cure Road Show is working towards getting 100 Congress people to sign onto a bill to pass the National Insurance Act. Thus far they have attained 86 signatures and are currently trying to persuade Ellsworth.

"Students can work with others in the community to pass HR 676, the National Health Insurance Act or they can form their own student group to make other students aware of how this issue affects them," Livingston said.

Smith said that everyone is affected by the lack of a universal health care system and the difficulties of funding for medical bills are felt across the country.

"Obviously there are many people suffering," Borchelt said. "I know that my significant other will get sick and wait for months because he couldn't pay for it. We need a system that will help."

To help with the cause, Smith encouraged people to reach out and understand all perspectives and to gather as much information as possible.

"Get educated," Smith said. "Don't just see 'SiCKO.' Talk to everyone else and then start making noise. I would go to places, watch the Michael Moore videos, talk to professors and talk amongst yourselves. Have debates, get other views about health care because you all really do have a different view on this world."

 Thursday, December 20, 2007 2:00 PM
SiCKO-Cure Road Show in West Virginia

At the Blue Moose Cafe in Morgantown, local nurse Catherine Forman, far left, of the California Nurses Association and the National Nurses Organizing Committee, joined in a discussion of health care reform along with local PNHP doctor Peter Wentzel, far right, and West Virginia State Legislator Barbara Evans Fleischauer, next to Dr. Wentzel. Other local nurses joined the group as did Laura Jones, director of the Milan Puskar Health Right Clinic.

The SiCKO Cure Road Show crew spent the day in West Virginia meeting with medical students, physicians, local activists, nurses and community members though a heavy rain fell and threatened to leave flooding in its wake. Just as they have found in every city and state they have visited since leaving Chicago on Nov. 11, the road show team met concerned Americans with thoughtful questions and deep worry. Many mentioned friends or family members with no health care coverage or who had suffered at the hands of the current health care system. And all knew the time for change has been upon this nation for some time.

By Donna Smith, American SiCKO

MORGANTOWN, West Virginia -- The SiCKO-Cure Road Show crew spent the day in West Virginia meeting with medical students, physicians, local activists, nurses and community members though a heavy rain fell and threatened to leave flooding in its wake. Just as they have found in every city and state they have visited since leaving Chicago on Nov. 11, the road show team met concerned Americans with thoughtful questions and deep worry. Many mentioned friends or family members with no health care coverage or who had suffered at the hands of the current health care system. And all knew the time for change has been upon this nation for some time.

At West Virginia University Health Sciences Center, the Healthcare-Now road show team led a lively discussion of health care reform issues followed by a showing of an HR676 video produced by the California Nurses Association (CNA) and Physicians for a National Health Plan (PNHP) and a Q&A session.

December 14th  ROAD SHOW FINISHES IN PITTSBURGH

Western PA Coalition for Single-Payer Healthcare www.WPaSingle-Payer.org
Grassroots Activists Join with Pa. State Senator Jim Ferlo and Others at National Healthcare Day Event
Call for Elected Officials to Support Single-Payer Reform

PITTSBURGH—The  Western PA Coalition for Single-Payer Healthcare joined forces  with State Senator Jim Ferlo in planning National Healthcare Day, which took place today in the lobby of the City-County Building.  This free event  highlighted the growing grassroots support for single-payer reform, as well as the mounting frustration of city and county government, organized labor, business, faith groups, healthcare providers, and consumers in managing the impact of spiraling healthcare costs under our present system.

Activists in scrubs could be seen leafletting downtown and encouraging people to come to the event, where videographers were taping  testimony of people’s healthcare stories, nurses and medical students were giving free blood pressure screenings, advocates staffed information tables on single-payer, and there was continuous showing of  “SiCKO” and  “H.R. 676:  The Single-Payer Solution.”

 H.R. 676 is the national single-payer bill in the U.S. House of Representatives introduced by Congressman John Conyers, Jr., with 86 cosponsors, including U.S. Representative Mike Doyle of Pittsburgh.  This legislation, called “Expanded and Improved Medicare for All,” would provide high quality, affordable healthcare coverage to all though a government financed, privately delivered system of care.  Sandy Fox, Co-Chair of the Coalition, noted that “single-payer is the only solution that is both socially and fiscally responsible.”

Senator Ferlo concurred, stating “…we can expand health insurance coverage to all Americans by building on the cost effective and efficiently administered federal Medicare system and elminating, once and for all, the private and non-profit health insurance corporations.  It’s time to support the single-payer system outlined in H.R. 676.”

Pittsburgh City Council President Doug Shields, who presented a Resolution

cosponsored by all members of Council  in support of National Healthcare Day and single-payer reform, called on other elected officials to “embrace the single payer concept and cast their votes accordingly.”

Rev. John Welch, President of the Pittsburgh Interfaith Impact Network, espoused his views on the immorality of the current healthcare system, noting  “The healthcare situation in our country…is one of the greatest atrocities in the world, yet so subtly destructive many seem equally anesthetized by it.  In my mind it is a form of passive euthanasia.”

Joining the event was the SiCKO-Cure Roadshow, sponsored by Healthcare-NOW, the national grassroots organization working for passage of H.R. 676.  The Roadshow ended its  11 states tour in Pittsburgh,  and included Donna Smith, who stated  “My family’s story is featured in ‘SiCKO’ not because we are so unique, but because we are not.  Millions of Americans like us suffer in spite of buying health insurance throughout our adult lives…  Now we must speak with one voice to our leaders and demand they listen.”

OK, TIME TO THINK ABOUT THE NEXT ROAD SHOW...your ideas? How about 10 Statewide Road Shows?  Send us your ideas: info@healthcare-now.org The Sicko-Cure Road Show, which has been traveling the nation to promote universal health care, visited Columbia on Dec. 3-4, stopping at the State House, Benedict College and USC as part of a 33-day tour that began Nov. 11  Photos from the Road Show Launching from Chicago, Julia, Gloria, Donna, Bill and Marilyn Joe Friendly and Tom Knoche The Raging Grannies, Pittsburgh Wilson, North Carolina Morgantown, West Virginia Debriefing with the Road Show crew at the Mendelson Gallery, Pittsburgh Rev. William Barber of Greenleaf Christian Church and Liv Boykins, formerly of Rep. Conyer's staff at the pulpit Tallahassee, Florida, the Alliance for Retired Americans and the Leon County Democratic Party; Elyse Seigle and Liv Boykin Donna Smith, Bill Hill, Elyse Seigle Jen, Elyse, Tom, Donna, Bill, Joe   Medical student Rekha Rapaka, of the University of Pittsburgh and the American Medical Student Association, and Dr. Dan Fine of PNHP chat about their shared goals during the “National Health Care Day” events in Pittsburgh .  Both were staffing table displays for their organization.  Photo by Donna Smith