[GPCA Updates] GP RELEASE Obama's choice: support health care for all Americans or support the insurance industry, say Greens

[Green Party of California Updates]

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GREEN PARTY OF THE UNITED STATES
http://www.gp.org

For Immediate Release:
Thursday, January 29, 2009


President Obama can either work to enact health care for all Americans
or he can support insurance and HMO industry profits, say Greens

• Mandates and other market-based plans will not solve the health care
crisis; Single-Payer (Medicare For All) makes health care a right for
all Americans

• Obama's plan for national computerization of medical records can
only guarantee patients' privacy and security under Single-Payer

• Green Party Speakers Bureau list of party activists available to
speak on health care: http://gp.org/speakers/speakers-health-care.php


WASHINGTON, DC -- President Obama has a choice -- he can either work
for universal health care or he can satisfy the demands of insurance
industry lobbies for continued private profit, said Green Party
leaders today.

Greens, in demanding a Single-Payer national health care program (also
called Medicare For All), said that there was no possibility of
guaranteed quality health care for every American under a market-based
system.  Rep. John Conyers' (D-Mich.) bill for Single-Payer (HR 676,
http://thomas.loc.gov/home/gpoxmlc110/h676_ih.xml) has strong Green
Party support, although many Greens also hope to see complementary
medicine brought under the Single-Payer umbrella.

"President Obama needs to follow his own campaign rhetoric and listen
to the American people.  In many of his own town hall meetings, the
demand for Single-Payer has been so strong that [Secretary of Health
and Human Services] Tom Daschle has asked to meet with Single-Payer
groups.  Single-Payer will make health care a human right -- one more
important than the 'right' of insurance companies to make a profit off
our need for health care," said said Mark Dunlea, New York Green,
member of the Hunger Action Network of New York State, and author of
"Can Incrementalism Be the Path to Universal Health Care?"
(http://www.hungeractionnys.org/increment.html)

Green Party leaders expressed special support for pro-Single-Payer
organizations and coalitions that have shifted into high gear under
the new presidential administration, including the Leadership
Conference for Guaranteed Health Care, Healthcare-NOW, California
Nurses Association, and Physicians for a National Health Program.

"President Obama's plan to have all medical records computerized
within five years has made Single-Payer even more urgent.  The plan
will create an enormous risk for patients' privacy and security, as
private health insurers try to weaken privacy safeguards and gain
access to records in an effort to exclude people from coverage, or
make coverage more expensive for clients they consider high-risk.
HMOs and insurance firms make their profits by cherry-picking patients
who are less costly to insure and by limiting treatment for those with
coverage, so they use medical records to determine who will be a
financial risk.  The only way to guarantee both protection from
predatory corporations and access to health care for all Americans is
to enact a Single-Payer program," said Jill Bussiere, co-chair of the
Green Party of the United States.

Greens have argued that enactment of a Single-Payer program would
boost the ailing US economy and provide relief for businesses large
and small, since it would cancel the high expense and administrative
burden of employer-based health care benefits
(http://www.gp.org/press/pr-national.php?ID=158).  Single-Payer would
lower the cost of health care for all middle- and low-income
Americans, since the amount of taxes necessary to sustain Single-Payer
would be far less than the cost of private coverage and medical fees.
No American will go bankrupt because of a medical emergency in a
Single-Payer system.

President Obama, despite supporting Single-Payer earlier in his
political career, now favors a health care plan that would maintain
private insurance industry control over Americans' health care.
Profit-making insurance, HMO, and pharmaceutical lobbies have a grip
on most Democratic and Republican members of Congress because of
campaign contributions and the influence of lobbyists.

Montana Senator Max Baucus, chair of the Senate Finance Committee,
wants the Single-Payer option "off the table" in the discussion on
health care reform and, along with other Democrats, has proposed a
market-based plan that would achieve universal coverage by requiring
Americans who lack health coverage to purchase insurance from a
private company.

"There will be no meaningful improvement in our nation's health care
system or any chance of universal care until Single-Payer is enacted
and profit-making insurance companies no longer decree who gets care
and what kind of care," said Jody Grage, treasurer of the Green Party
of the United States.  "Any 'mandate' reform plan that leaves private
insurers in charge will either result in inadequate care or in huge
taxpayer-funded subsidies to cover the loss of profits for HMOs and
insurance companies compelled to cover people these companies would
otherwise exclude.  Single-Payer will cover all Americans regardless
of age, income, or prior medical condition, and by eliminating the
need for private insurers and the high profit rate they demand."

"Even state based Single-Payer initiatives are being undermined by the
president's insurance-based proposal.  Here in Pennsylvania we have a
strong bill, with the funding included and a governor who has agreed
to sign the legislation if passed (http://www.healthcare4allpa.org).
Yet the Healthcare for All Now campaign, which supports the Obama
plan, is trying to give the illusion of change, while maintaining the
inefficient, exploitative insurance model.  It amounts to a waste of
tax dollars to provide more government money to insurance companies,"
said Carl Romanelli, 2006 Pennsyvlania Green candidate for the US
Senate.

Read "An International Perspective on Health Care Reform" by
Connecticut Green Party member John R. Battista, MD
(http://www.gp.org/first100/?p=119), published on the Green Party's
web site as part of "The First 100 Days: What Would a Green
Administration Look Like?" (http://www.gp.org/first100)

For a comparison of mandate plans and Single-Payer , see "Talking
Points: Why the mandate plans won't work, and why Single-Payer
'Medicare for All' is what we need" by Len Rodberg, PhD, published by
Physicians for a National Health Program
(http://www.pnhp.org/news/2008/december/talking_points_why_.php).

Green Party information page on Single-Payer:
http://www.gp.org/organize/sicko.html

Video clips:
2008 Green presidential candidate Cynthia McKinney speaks on
Single-Player health care and racial health care disparities
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEHd4lRVUuU
More on health care: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEHd4lRVUuU
Health, the environment, and the economy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PVNTOa8owQQ


MORE INFORMATION

Green Party of the United States http://www.gp.org
202-319-7191, 866-41GREEN
Fax 202-319-7193
• Tally of Green election victories
http://www.gp.org/2008-elections/election-results.html
• Green candidate news http://www.gp.org/2008-elections/candidate-news.php
• Green candidate database for 2008 and other campaign information:
http://www.gp.org/elections.shtml
• Green Party News Center http://www.gp.org/newscenter.shtml
• Green Party Speakers Bureau http://www.gp.org/speakers
• Green Party ballot access page http://www.gp.org/2008-elections

"The First 100 Days: What Would a Green Administration Look Like?"
http://www.gp.org/first100


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