Michelle Moquin's "A day in the life of…"

Okay, well maybe it’s not that easy, but your participation in making it happen is. Our healthcare system is sicko.  At the end of January, John Conyers introduced his universal healthcare legislation - The bill – known last session as H.R. 676, is a fave of the healthcare reformers who back a single payer system.  I’m for that. - Put the private insurers out of business. Sound like we’re putting more people out of jobs?  Well…not so fast, Conyers says to hire back the employees. 

“The Program shall provide that clerical, administrative, and billing personnel in insurance companies, doctors offices, hospitals, nursing facilities, and other facilities whose jobs are eliminated due to reduced administration (1) should have first priority in retraining and job placement in the new system; and (2) shall be eligible to receive 2 years of unemployment benefits.”

Some people don’t like the idea of government being in control of the healthcare system. But helloo…who is in control now? – who tells us who we can see and who we can’t see? The insurers. And quite frankly, I am sicko of how the system works. It’s obvious we need something new…something that’s going to benefit everyone. This healthcare system will. And Being that Obama is now our president, I trust that he is the one president that truly has our best interest at heart.  We will save billions and possibly trillions of dollars from the simple act of putting private insurers out of business and creating a healthy healthcare system….one that grows and works for the people.

These are just some of the benefits:

• Every citizen of the US will be covered from birth to death.
• No more pre-existing conditions to be excluded from coverage.
• No more expensive deductibles or co-pays.
• All prescription medications will be covered.
• All dental and eye care will be included.
• Mental health and substance abuse care will be fully covered.
• Long term and nursing home services will be included.
• You will always choose your own doctors and hospitals.
• Costs of coverage will be assessed on a sliding scale basis.
• Tremendously simplified system of medical administration
• Total portability – your coverage not tied to any job or location.
• Existing Medicare benefits for those over 65 will remain the same or be vastly improved in many cases.

Sounds good huh?

A few days ago I mentioned that we were going to get some sample letters together on some issues that were important to us and hopefully important to you too.  Healthcare reform is one of them.

Zen Lill and I spoke this past weekend and yesterday afternoon she e-mailed me a sample letter and the contact websites to post on our first topic…you guessed it: Healthcare Reform. If this is an important issue for you, which I hope it is, ZL has made it very simple to get involved.  I want to give a big thanks to her for gathering this information for me/us this morning. 

Now, I’m going to make it even simpler by helping you use this information by following these easy steps:  

Step 1:  Do your research. Yes, it may take a little bit of time but I’ve made it easy for you. Read about H.R. 676  and google it if you need more information. Get informed so that you can get behind it. 

Step 2:  Read the following letter. If you like what this letter has to say and you believe in this bill, copy the following letter as is or edit to make it personal.

Sample Letter:

Dear Representative or Senator___________

In honor of the 40th anniversary of the passage of Medicare, we urge you to join us in a movement toward the most cost-effective health care coverage, that of public payer, private provider health care modeled on Medicare. Medicare is one of the most effective and popular programs ever created by the U. S. Congress. It has reduced poverty by providing a single large risk pool with single payer healthcare coverage for a large segment of our population, the disabled and the elderly. It has increased their productivity and quality of life, even as Medicare overhead costs remain a low 2-3%, much lower than those of private for-profit insurances.

As noted in a recent study, 60-70% of Americans favor government-backed health insurance for themselves and their families, as remedy to the following shortcomings of U.S. health care:

$270 billion of health care dollars annually go toward excess administrative costs

Over 18,000 people die annually due to lack of access to health care.

There are over 43 million uninsured, and more under-insured.

Medical costs account for almost 50 percent of U.S. personal bankruptcies.

The World Health Organization ranks the U.S. 37^th of all industrialized nations for health care outcomes.

In response to the U.S. crisis of health care access, we urge you to co-sponsor H.R. 676 in the House, or a comparable bill in the Senate for improved Medicare for all in America.  Solutions proposed by H.R. 676, the United States National Health Insurance Act, are affirmed by the most recent study by the National Coalition on Health Care, citing single-risk-pool government-backed insurance as most cost-effective means to universal health care. Medicare for All would save our country hundreds of billions of dollars in administrative costs, while providing comprehensive coverage for all, with a full choice of doctors. No other initiative would provide such immediate benefits, while cutting costs for all sectors of society, e.g., education, big and small business, labor, etc. Our current inefficient, inflationary health care delivery system renders U.S. business increasingly less competitive in the world, and results in inflated costs of goods and services to consumers. Currently, $1,500 is added to the cost of each U.S.-made automobile alone, the result of cost-shifting due to increasing costs to corporations for employee health coverage.

We can no longer afford to squander 10′s of billions of dollars of tax subsidies (allocated by Medicare Prescription Reform) for an insurance industry that funnels a large percentage of our health care dollars toward corporate profits and administrative waste, while increasingly denying consumers primary health care access. We can do much better with a healthcare system that we own, that permits free choices, and ready health care access. No additional expenditure is needed; in fact, we would save billions of dollars. We already pay for it, and we want it to serve all ? a single-risk pool, universal, comprehensive healthcare system. We urge your support for H.R. 676, or a comparable bill in the Senate!

Sincerely,

Your Signature here

Full name

Address

Phone/e-mail address

Step 3:  Click here to send the letter to your representatives. This will take you to a page that will show you the map of the U.S. Click on your state and your house representative. From there you will be able to either e-mail them directly through the contact page, (simply copy and paste your letter into an e-mail) or you can copy the mailing address down and send your letter via snail mail. Your choice.

You’re not done yet :) Now send the same letter to congress. Click  here and it will take you to a page where you will see 3 drop down menus. You can either 1) choose a state, 2) choose a senator, or 3) choose a class. To make it easy, I suggest you use the 1) choose a state drop down menu. When you click on your state, your senators names will appear with their e-mail and mailing address information. Use the web form for e-mail or copy the mailing address for snail mail. Again, your choice. 

I suggest mailing your letter to the representative in your area and both Senators, if your state has more than one – most do. 

Other hints: Remember to put your name and address on the letter and on the envelope. (You can inc your phone/e-mail address if you’d like to but it isn’t essential).  Just keep in mind, no one (in the US government) acknowledges a letter without contact information.

Simple yes? Now you have no excuse. Just do it.  (Thanks)

Gratefully your blog host,

michelle

Aka BABE: Your Bad Ass Bitch Editor

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