MEDICAL PERSONNEL FOR SINGLE PAYER HR-676
"Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP)": Dr. Oliver Fein, President: (who was invited to President Obama's Healthcare Summit along with Rep. John Conyers-- who actually wrote HR-676 and of which the PNHP fully backs):
"The American Medical Students Association":
"The American College of Physicians" (the 2nd largest group of physicians in the US):
"The Annals of Internal Medicine" (trade journal) poll: 59% of US physicians support legislation to support a single-payer national health insurance program:
"The California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee":
This is a letter signed by 500 Massachussettes physicians to Senator Ted Kennedy critical of Massachussettes' Healthcare Reform being used as a national model and endorsing, instead, HR-676. Remember, these are from actual physicians that are out there in the trenches and have had to deal with the Massachussettes reform since 2006.
"February 18, 2009
Senator Edward M. Kennedy
317 Russell Senate Building
Washington D.C. 20510
Dear Senator Kennedy:
We understand that you are working energetically on a comprehensive health care reform bill. We write as Massachusetts physicians and as your constituents who have experienced firsthand the consequences of our state's health care reform. We seek to alert you to the defects in the Massachusetts approach and to advise that you push, instead, for a singlepayer reform.
At certain junctures in history, the obstacles of the past melt in the heat of a rising popular demand for change. Now is such a time.
You once proudly described yourself as "an old single-payer advocate," and you have previously introduced model single-payer health reform legislation. We urge you to return to that vision now when your tremendous influence could make this truly just and practical plan a reality.
Please consider the simplicity, cost effectiveness and humanity of a single-payer plan, which could be implemented comparatively easily like traditional Medicare. Any plan that retains private insurers will add layers of bureaucracy and fail to control costs, dooming the noble effort to assure good care for all.
The Massachusetts reform is illustrative of these problems. Costs have skyrocketed -rising far faster than anticipated. Yet hundreds of thousands remain uninsured and the number of patients requiring free care has fallen by only a third. Surveys show that one of every seven Massachusetts residents still can't afford the care they need, and among patients directly affected by the new law, more say it has hurt than helped them. We fear that worse is just around the corner; money needed to fund the reform is being drained from safety-net providers who still carry a heavy burden of care for the uninsured and underinsured.
We ask that you introduce in the Senate legislation modeled on H.R. 676, which gained the support of 94 representatives in 110th Congress, and which has the backing of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, hundreds of unions, and thousands of physicians.
We urge you to be our Tommy Douglas - the founder of Canada's national health program who, according to surveys, remains the most beloved of all Canadians. Surely we deserve the health benefits that are guaranteed in every other developed nation - all medically necessary care, and freedom from the fear of economic ruin due to illness. Only a move to single payer can cut bureaucratic waste, allowing an affordable expansion of care.
We must not squander the opportunity of this momentous time. With your experience and stature you are uniquely able to ensure that generations to come will enjoy the legacy of health care as a human right."
