More Than a Prayer for Single Payer

[HM2VikingRN, RN]

roger bybee: what drew you into fighting for universal healthcare as a doctor?

[VivaLasViejas, ASN, RN]

Huh?

[Music in My Heart]

This is the link, I think:

http://prospect.org/cs/articles?article=more_than_a_prayer_for_single_payer

[x_coastie]

the american prospect is far from a unbiased source, and any information that come from it should be carefully weighed.

from their own web site; "the american prospect was founded in 1990 as an authoritative magazine of liberal ideas, committed to a just society, an enriched democracy, and effective liberal politics."

of course they are going to write a pro-liberal, higher tax, bigger government article.

i hope a few states (ca for one) can go through with universal health care prior to it going nation wide so we can see the effects on nurse's pay and benefits.

[HM2VikingRN, RN]

roger bybee: what drew you into fighting for universal healthcare as a doctor?

steffie woolhandler: it became obvious that there was a lot we could do for patients in terms of helping them live longer and preventing disease, but we couldn't do any of it if they didn’t come into our offices. it became really clear that the financing system was an obvious barrier to care for our patients. tens of millions lack insurance or have poor insurance.

there's tremendous ferment going on at the state level in terms of reform. how do you evaluate these plans that, for example, require individuals to purchase insurance policies, as in massachusetts under mitt romney?

i think the massachusetts bill, the romney plan, is a hoax. it won't get us to universal coverage. the fundamental assumption is that the uninsured have enough money to buy insurance policies, that they can buy their way out of the predicament. if they had the money, they'd already have insurance! they don't have money in the first place. someone my age, in their 50s, and making over $29,400 a year, would get no subsidy. the cost of that premium would be $4,200 a year, but along with that there's a $2,000 deductible before any coverage begins, co-pays, and co-insurance after that first $2,000.

that kind of coverage is worthless to a low-income person. they don't have money for the premium, and they can't pay the $2000 out of pocket. i don't call that insurance, i call it a hoax. you're not going to be able to cover everyone with those kinds of premiums. and expansion of medicaid won't get us to universal coverage, either. we've had 10-plus years of experience with that.

http://prospect.org/cs/articles?article=more_than_a_prayer_for_single_payer

here is the text of the original excerpt. (fwiw i don't think conservative automatically equals good any more than liberal automatically equals bad.)

[Music in My Heart]

x_coastie, a more effective response would be to argue with the points made by the physician rather than to discount her views out of hand because you don't care for the political slant of the messenger.

Your desire to have certain states try single-payer is not a good one. If only one state did it then of course you'd have sick people migrating to that state to receive their medical care. It needs to be a national solution using the power of the federal government to regulate. The states simply don't have the power required to make it work.

[Cosper123]

x_coastie, a more effective response would be to argue with the points made by the physician rather than to discount her views out of hand because you don't care for the political slant of the messenger.

Your desire to have certain states try single-payer is not a good one. If only one state did it then of course you'd have sick people migrating to that state to receive their medical care. It needs to be a national solution using the power of the federal government to regulate. The states simply don't have the power required to make it work.

I disagree. This is something that in my opinion has to be done on the state level. We need a state to set and example of how things CAN work, and on a smaller scale something this big can be managed more effectively (on par with the various western style nations that have a single payer system).

Yes you would have some flock to the state to get medical coverage, but you'd also see a huge shift in businesses to that state. Lets not forget the reason that some republicans are now seeing the light...the pressure put on the major corperations by health care adds on average 1,600 to a cost of a car, for example.

And California would be the perfect state to do such a thing, being the worlds 8th largest economy and a trendsetter in various ways. Likewise this could bring a big boom to various right-to-work southern states to keep unions less desireable. In addition, it would be easier to pull off even getting a single payer system started on a state level.

So coastie was right, just not in the selfish way they intended. It does stand to reason that we as nurses will take a significant cut in pay in a single payer system, just look at any other country with socialized medicine...but hey I didn't get into this profession for the money.

[HM2VikingRN, RN]

The funny thing is that MN is one of the states closest to Universal coverage and our nurses are paid very well on average.

[pickledpepperRN]

Militants in tennis shoes[

B]Nurses Association won't bend on health reform[/b]

…"There are 18,000 people dying every year in the United States because they don't have healthcare," he says. "That's six 9/11's a year."

Listening to Graham's story is an uncomfortable experience. The Nurses Association knows that; it's why it brought him to California at a time when legislators and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger are negotiating health insurance reform the nurses believe falls short of an authentic solution.

Alone among interest groups in Sacramento, the Nurses Association opposes any healthcare reform that falls short of blowing up the private insurance-based system and replacing it with a Medicare-style system in which everyone would be insured by the government….

http://www.venturacountystar.com/news/2007/sep/12/militants-in-tennis-shoes/

[lamazeteacher]

I wish doctors would feel more comfortable with auxillary healthcare providers like NPs and PHNs giving information such as she wants patients to come to her office to receive.

[pickledpepperRN]

Why the U.S. lacks full health care

…As some of the richest most powerful citizens in America, health care executives dominate health policy with their campaign donations and active lobbying. They spend millions to keep themselves in the insurance business despite overwhelming evidence we all would be better off without them. They use these profits to propagandize the American public and influence voters through scare tactics of "socialized medicine" and long delays of service that supposedly occur in single-payer systems….

http://www.willitsnews.com/columnists/ci_7159806