Single Payer the way to go for Health Insurance Reform

single payer would eliminate private insurance, saving nearly $400 billion annually on insurance and provider paperwork, enough to cover the uninsured and plug the gaps in coverage for those with insurance.

In 2007, 62 percent of U.S. bankruptcies occurred in the wake of medical illness, and 77 percent of those in medical bankruptcy had health insurance (usually private insurance) when they first got sick.

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Private health insurance is a defective consumer product, and Congress has no business forcing uninsured Americans to buy it.

In order to get the bill out of committee, Speaker Nancy Pelosi promised single-payer supporters, led by Representative Anthony Weiner of New York a floor vote in the fall. This is a tremendous victory for single-payer supporters like my group, the 16,000-member Physicians for a National Health Program. Members of Congress, many of whom say they personally support single payer, must now go on record on the eve of the 2010 electoral cycle. Constituents take note!


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All in it together Universal Health

American culture simply has never been based on caring about what happened to your neighbor.” Unfortunately, this is ultimately what this health care debate comes down to. “I’ve got mine; the fact that you don’t have yours is not my problem” is the thinking.

There is a right and ethical way to do things in this world, and the ethical thing to do here in one of the richest countries in the world is to provide health care for all Americans, regardless of whether they can individually pay for it or not.

Yes, socialized medicine is one way to describe it, but what exactly is wrong with that? Who do the opponents of a public health care option think make the medical decisions about health care? The insurance companies do. They are far more concerned about their profit margin than the government will ever be, if it is ultimately to make these same decisions.

And, at least, with universal coverage, we will all have the option of having someone make those decisions, whether the government or insurers, rather than just some of us.