The current focus of US politics is health care reform, and I think we can expect that to continue for some time. But rarely have I seen the issue reduced to such crystal clarity as it is in the following article.
The right-wing anti-Obama-care movement is OK with killing off tens of thousands of Americans each year.
That's what this is all about: The right-wingers and their corporate sponsors are protecting a medieval and violent health care system that kills more Americans each year than all the Americans who have died in the war on terror since 2001, including the 3,000 victims of 9/11, and the 5,000-plus U.S. service members who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Every two months, the American health care industry is party to the slaughter of more Americans than al-Qaida managed to kill. Osama bin Laden must look at the Tea Baggers, FreedomWorks, health-industry billionaires like Rick Scott and the rest, and think, "If only I could kill as many Americans as they do! These guys are pros!"
They need to answer for this -- they need to explain why they are trying to protect a system that kills 22,000 Americans per year -- a figure based on a landmark report by the prestigious Institute of Medicine.
In fact, 22,000 is a conservative figure -- one of the authors of that report thinks the real figure in 2006 alone was 27,000 Americans killed from our health care system, perhaps as high as 40,000. But I'll stick to the conservative casualty number of 22,000, which is horrific enough… [emphasis added]
Inserted from <Alter-Net>
I recommend that you check the two embedded links and read the reports yourselves. Assuming that it will take until the beginning of 2013 to take effect, approximately 71,500 more Americans will be sacrificed at the altar of corporate greed. How many more must die? Please contact your Senators and Representatives to tell them authentic health care reform cannot wait. For their contact information Click Here.
9 comments:
Health care reform not health insurance reform.
Amen to that, Mark, but both.
Yes, we actually need BOTH.. at this time we can't do one without the other. Our economy can't stand doing away with the insurance companies.. not right now, so the only option is to do it this way and build on it in the future..
Annette is right - most great changes have taken place incrementally, even the establishment of Social Security and Medicare. The full programs we know how took time to build.
Health care transformation is what is needed. You cannot put a band aid on a system whose carotid is gushing.
I don’t agree that the insurance industry is indispensible to the economy. Quite the contrary, they are sucking our life blood. Aside from the human casualties, corporations can’t compete in a global environment where companies do not have the responsibility of providing health care to the workforce. Yes, GM had plants in Canada because they have a single payer system!
There are so many industries waiting to flourish, if only we would give them a leg up, i.e. high speed rail transport, alternative energy (auto workers in Windsor, Canada are being retrained in wind technology). Putting new graduates with bleak job prospects to work in the inner cities and rural pockets of extreme poverty in clinics, schools. In early childhood education and senior centers. Working with organizations like Remote Area Medical, originally intended for developing countries, but now delivering care to residents in Tennessee and South Los Angeles where lines snaked around blocks – on the first day, 1500 people had flowed through the temporary doors of the unit.
I think Annette and Maui have a good point, but so does Gabrielle. As I see it, going immediately to single-payer would cause a major hit on Wall Street, still shaky from the excesses of eight years of No Millionaire Left Behind. In addition, it would put thousands of health insurance workers out of a job. In addition, getting single payer through Congress will not happen this year, so it's a moot point. Gabrielle is certainly correct that Big Insurance is sucking our life blood, that employer based health insurance hobbles US companies in the world economy, and that we need to tale the lead in the industries she listed. However, I think the best that we can hope, this year, is that we'll get the public option, that people will see how superior it is to the insurance industry, and move to it, phasing out the greedy companies over time.
Canada has the second biggest land mass of any country in the world, and we love Americans. There's room for everyone here. Y'all need to move to Canada, and we'll show you how it's done. :-)
thanks Jo, I just might take ya up on that!!
Josie and Sue. from a TomCat perspective, Canada sounds purrrfect!
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