If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
The Blog
The CBO recently issued a disheartening report showing that 10 Medicare demonstration projects designed to reduce health care costs were largely ineffective. The results were discouraging, but perhaps not entirely surprising.
For full disclosure, I am a Catholic, I am a Democrat and I am a woman. I am also someone who if push came to shove can afford to pay over the counter for birth control. But the false outcry this week over the need to cover birth control has made me raving mad.
The American clinical research system is not designed to maximize the potential for the best possible outcomes of health services that are delivered to all American health care consumers.
Somewhere between the comical and the incredulous, the GOP has simply channeled its inner hatred. There is, literally, nothing they will give Obama credit for and a whole host of fictive evils the responsibility for which they regularly lay at his feet.
As a church, we need to re-examine the ways we are supporting (or failing to support) women and men who are struggling with sexuality, the economy, and the difficult decisions involved in responsible parenting.
Despite the ceaseless spin, Vermont lawmakers last May demonstrated they could not be bought nor intimidated when they became the first in the nation to pass a bill that will probably establish a single-payer beachhead in the U.S.
The overarching goal of health care reform was to attempt to ensure affordable access to health insurance and medical care for most Americans. It barely touches skyrocketing health-care costs and accelerates primary-care physician shortages.
The media likes to lift up singular "heroes" who are "making a difference." But political change is not made by individuals on their own.
The public hates health insurance companies. They believe they are greedy and put profits before people's health. This is personal for people, so many of whom have their own health insurance horror stories.
At the end of the day, each woman has to be able to make these health-related decisions for herself. It is not her employer, but her own sense of morality and the counsel of her doctor that must guide her choices.
Early on a September morning I got a call from a member of the HCAN Steering Committee. The message was brief: someone at the White House had called SEIU and asked that I be fired.
I invite you to think about what aging with dignity and independence means. Then take time to have the tough conversations with your loved ones about what is important to you as you grow older, and how you will get help should you require daily assistance.
With Mitt Romney's hold on the Republican nomination looking secure, the Tea Party will soon have to face the reality that despite pushing the Republican Party and its nominee to the right, they'll wind up losing the fight in the end. This isn't the first time.
Eventually our nation will need to decide if we really want the people who care for our children, serve our food, and whose children attend school with our children to have significantly worse healthcare.
All the Republican presidential candidates -- this year and stretching back for many campaigns -- propose damage caps and other rollbacks to the public's right to sue when injured by medical mistakes.
To build and maintain affordable medical care, we must buy collectively through either private insurance or government social insurance.
