CommonHealth Newsletter - Fall 2011

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UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE EDUCATION FUND ~ VOLUME 5, NUMBER 2 ~ FALL 2011 Universal Health Care Education Fund c/o Mass-Care 33 Harrison Avenue, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02111 P: 617-723-7001, F: 617-723-7002 [email protected] http://www.masscare.org CommonHealth We gathered at Occupy Boston in Dewey Square to hold a spirited rally for the real healthcare reform which we call single payer and against every manner of disparity in our existing inadequate sys- tem. Among our dynamic speakers was Katie Murphy, RN, Mass-Care secretary (left). Led by health professional students, members of Mass- Care, Physicians for a National Health Program, allied clini- cians and people from all walks of life then marched through the financial district and up Beacon Hill for an equally spirited rally in front of the State House, followed by a parade down to Louisburg Square to remind Senator John Kerry and the debt-deal Committee of Twelve that any Congressional attack on Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security would be met with righteous anger. We’ve all come to understand that the country is awash in money but that it is in the wrong hands and being used all too often for nefarious purposes. Our march came toward the end of a momentous year of mass education. We’ve learned from the Arab Spring that arrogance on high must be confronted and that desperation is no longer tolerable. The people found their power. Attacks on the rights of public sector workers, especially in the Heartland, provoked the most massive and prolonged battle seen here in decades. Organized nursing brought forward the demand: “No cutbacks, no concessions!” In June the US Chamber of Commerce headquarters in DC was picketed by a thousand nurses and their allies demanding a Main Street Contract for the American People, including strengthened and improved Medicare for all, to be funded by a financial transaction tax on Wall Street activity. Then on September 17th, hundreds of young people moved into Zuccotti Park in Lower Manhattan, two blocks from Wall Street and a stone’s throw from Ground Zero. Occupy Wall Street was born, an in-your-face challenge to the 1% that lords it over the 99%. Within weeks, many hundreds of such encampments blossomed across the country and around the world, many near their city’s financial hub. Occupy Boston is a prime example. It quickly became the meeting ground for many labor, environmental, peace and healthcare activists, the locus from which sorties moved out to confront corporate exploiters and their political enablers. So our choice to rally there was a natural. (continued on page 2) Day of Action November 12th Mass-Care’s Bea Mikuleckyi & Pat Berger, with Katie Murphy & Marvin Miller behind

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Fall 2011 issue of "CommonHealth," the biannual newsletter of the Universal Health Care Education Fund (UHCEF) and Mass-Care.

Transcript of CommonHealth Newsletter - Fall 2011

Page 1: CommonHealth Newsletter - Fall 2011

UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE EDUCATION FUND ~ VOLUME 5, NUMBER 2 ~ FALL 2011

Universal Health Care Education Fund c/o Mass-Care33 Harrison Avenue, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02111

P: 617-723-7001, F: [email protected] http://www.masscare.org

CommonHealthWe gathered at Occupy Boston in Dewey Square to hold a spirited rally for the real healthcare reform which we call single payer and against every manner of disparity in our existing inadequate sys-tem. Among our dynamic speakers was Katie Murphy, RN, Mass-Care secretary (left). Led by health professional students, members of Mass-Care, Physicians for a National Health Program, allied clini-cians and people from all walks of life then marched through the financial district and up Beacon Hill for an

equally spirited rally in front of the State House, followed by a parade down to Louisburg Square to remind Senator John Kerry and the debt-deal Committee of Twelve that any Congressional attack on Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security would be met with righteous anger.

We’ve all come to understand that the country is awash in money but that it is in the wrong hands and being used all too often for nefarious purposes. Our march came toward the end of a momentous year of mass education.

We’ve learned from the Arab Spring that arrogance on high must be confronted and that desperation is no longer tolerable. The people found their power. Attacks on the rights of public sector workers, especially in the Heartland, provoked the most massive and prolonged battle seen here in decades. Organized nursing brought forward the demand: “No cutbacks, no concessions!” In June the US Chamber of Commerce headquarters in DC was picketed by

a thousand nurses and their allies demanding a Main Street Contract for the American People, including strengthened and improved Medicare for all, to be funded by a financial transaction tax on Wall Street activity.

Then on September 17th, hundreds of young people moved into Zuccotti Park in Lower Manhattan, two blocks from Wall Street and a stone’s throw from Ground Zero. Occupy Wall Street was born, an in-your-face challenge to the 1% that lords it over the 99%. Within weeks, many hundreds of such encampments blossomed across the country and

around the world, many near their city’s financial hub. Occupy Boston is a prime example. It quickly became the meeting ground for many labor, environmental, peace and healthcare activists, the locus from which sorties moved out to confront corporate exploiters and their political enablers. So our choice to rally there was a natural. (continued on page 2)

Day of Action November 12th

Mass-Care’s Bea Mikuleckyi & Pat Berger,with Katie Murphy & Marvin Miller behind

Page 2: CommonHealth Newsletter - Fall 2011

UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE EDUCATION FUND ~ VOLUME 5, NUMBER 2 ~ FALL 2011

Massachusetts Medical Society2011 Workforce Survey

For the past two years the Massachusetts Medical Society has carried out a survey of its members’ attitudes regarding healthcare reform, as part of its annual physicians workforce survey. The results of the 2011 survey revealed that 41% of members felt that a single-payer national healthcare system offering universal health care to all US residents was their choice of an optimal system. This represented a 7% increase since 2010.

The other choices in this survey were as follows:

1. Both public and private plans with a public buy-in option which would allow businesses and individuals to enroll in a public Medicare-like health-insurance plan that would compete with private plans. 23% of physicians chose this option.2. The National Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (also known as Obama care). This plan does not have a public option but maintains Medicare and Medicaid. 17% of physicians chose this option.3. Keep the existing mix of private insurance plans, Medicare, Medicaid and the Veterans Administration coverage. 15% of physicians chose this option.4. Other plans were chosen by 4% of physicians.

These results show that a majority of Massachusetts physicians support a government-sponsored Medicare-like plan either as a public option (23%) or as a single payer approach (41%). There are presently bills in the Massachusetts legislature which address these two options. It is time for Massachusetts physicians to make their preferences known to move forward a vote which would allow Massachusetts to join Vermont in eventually establishing a Medicare for All type of healthcare reform. - Leo Stolbach, MD

Barbeque & Bake-Off for Health Care Justice!

On October 9th Mass-Care hosted a contest for mouth-watering b a r b e c u e d appetizers and delectable baked desserts as a fundraiser at Larz Anderson Park in Brookline. The grilling competi-

tors included Ben Day, Executive Director of Mass-Care, Rob Hall, waiter at Grille 23, Jennifer Doe, JwJ, and Mike Fiske, owner of Fiske & Co. 

The bakers were Olivia Alfond, former Mass-Care intern, Judy Deutsch, Chair of Mass-Care’s Legislative Committee, Margaret Reeve Panahi, family nurse practitioner, and Denise Zwahlen, physician’s assistant.

The esteemed judges were Jay Murray, Executive Chef at Grille 23, State Senator Jamie Eldridge and Mohamed Maenaoui, former Executive Chef at the Barking Crab. Dr. Arnold Relman roused the happy feasters with a lively talk on why we need a single payer system!  A great time was had by all! - Pat Berger, MD

Day of Action (Continued)

On a personal note, on October 13th on my way home from the Greater Boston Labor Council rally at Occupy Boston, I received the call that two Massachusetts nurses were needed the next morning to help New York nurses erect a tent over the first aid station at Occupy Wall Street. So bright and early, Carlotta Starks and I from the Massa-chusetts Nurses Association hopped the Acela. A threat by NYC officials to sweep clean Liberty Plaza (aka Zuccotti Park) earlier that morning had been thwarted by thou-sands of trade unionists emerging from the subway at six o’clock to pack the area. NYC ordinances prohibit tents in parks, so we nurses and medics successfully erected the tent and reorganized the dispensary as an act of civil disobedience, despite surrounding police.

Among the youthful occupiers there, the hungry found hot food, the homeless found shelter, the poor found the rudiments of health care and children found books to read. Wall Street financiers had no interest in nutrition, decent housing, health care or education unless they could turn a profit. The limits of allowable dissent had been reached, so without notice batons and tear gas were brought to bear in the wee hours of November 15th and Liberty Plaza was reduced to Zuccotti Park once again. The first aid station, tent and all, sleeping bags, food and five thousand books were tossed into garbage trucks and destroyed. A fascist book-burning couldn’t have been more thorough. In an apparently coordinated effort, similar violent assaults have occurred on occupation sites across the country, with the wounding of two Iraq Marine Corps veterans in Oakland and the pepper-spraying of seated students at the University of California in Davis the most shocking.

And so on Capitol Hill, a partial victory was won on November 21st as the Committee of Twelve ack-nowledged deadlock. Massive cuts are still slated to take place, but now is the time to plan to turn the 2012 elections into a referendum on the austerity plans of the 1%. Now is the time to demand no cuts whatsoever to vital social programs. This is the time to insist on the strengthening of Medicare and Social Security. We shall forge ahead in the fight to create a just healthcare system for all! - Sandy Eaton, RN, Editor

Nurses & Medics Commit Civil Disobedience

Senator Jamie Eldridge & Ben Day

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UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE EDUCATION FUND ~ VOLUME 5, NUMBER 2 ~ FALL 2011Professor Hsiao Brings Vermont Single Payer

Plan to Massachusetts Legislature

Professor William Hsiao, PhD, currently the Li Professor of Economics at the Harvard School of Public Health, gave a thought-provoking briefing to the Massachusetts legislature November 14th. Dr. Hsiao has been the architect of single-payer systems in eight countries and is now working with the governor and the legislature of Vermont to plan single payer reform for Vermont by 2017.

Dr. Hsiao’s strategy specifically addresses the political as well as the economic issues in the campaign for single payer reform. His team in Vermont had in-depth talks with all the stakeholders including patients, doctors, hospitals, lawyers, insurance companies, workers and employers to determine what they might all agree on and how much they are willing to compromise to win an agreement. The final step in gaining support for single payer is to create incentives built into the law to motivate stakeholders to support the change.

Dr. Hsiao’s team collected data showing how single payer addresses the spiraling cost of healthcare, provides universal access, and how it affects different stakeholders. Specific findings:

• Vermont’s health expenditures as a share of Gross State Product (GSP) have risen from 12% in 2000 to 18.5% in 2009.

• Vermont’s single payer system projected savings of 25.3% based on an integrated delivery system, reduction in fraud and abuse, lowering the administrative costs generated by the health insurance industry, reduced cost of billing by doctors and hospitals and reform of medical malpractice.

• Single payer will increase the number of jobs in Vermont by increasing the amount of money people will have to spend because of decreased medical costs.

• The Vermont GSP will increase because of the increase in jobs.

Key to achieving a single payer system, Dr. Hsiao says we need support of physicians, strong grassroots support, and buy-in from other stakeholders. While we in Massachusetts are waiting to get the support we need, we should push for a comprehensive all-payer claim data base to reduce fraud and reduce total health care spending by 5%. We should also push uniform payment methods and claim adjudication rules, and develop an integrated health delivery system. With this kind of single payer infrastructure we can win when there is an opening in the political climate. - Pat Berger, MD

The Massachusetts Model of Health Reform in Practice & the Future of National Health Reform

If you have forty-five minutes, read the entire report that was released in November by Mass-Care and Massachusetts Physicians for a National Health Program, available at:

http://www.masscare.org/massachusetts-health-reform-in-practice

You'll find some surprising and compelling information! If you have five minutes, read the two-page executive summary in the report. In you only have two minutes, read the following list of some of the findings:

• The state has significantly decreased the percentage of uninsured (from 10.4% in 2006 to 5.6% in 2010 according to Census Bureau's Current Population Survey).

• In order to manage the state's portion of the healthcare costs, the state's Commonwealth Care program has cut enrollment eligibility and reduced benefits (e.g. dental and eyeglass coverage).

• The changes in reimbursement rates for Medicaid have had a negative effect on our safety net providers (community health centers and hospitals serving large numbers of the uninsured and publicly insured).

• The increases in health care costs are negatively affecting the insurance coverage of small business employees. The percentage of total enrollees in small group plans that have high healthcare coverage (covering more than 80% of medical costs covered by insurance) has decreased dramatically from 78% to 23%.

• The increased costs have resulted in an unfair burden with some lower income groups paying proportionally more. Those with a family income of $20,000 - $41,000 (those in the second 20% income range), increased the percentage of their family income on health care spending by 4.6%, compared with only a 0.4% increase for those with family incomes of $111,000 and greater (those in the top 20% income range).

• A significant portion of the increase (estimated as $817,000,000 increase for the year 2009) in cost has been born by the federal government, which means that your Federal income tax dollars are paying that portion of the cost increase.

• Many of the figures quoted in the media for Massachusetts healthcare reform are misleading, if not inaccurate.

• Massachusetts health care reform is unsustainable from a cost perspective.

- Norman Daoust, Cambridge-Somerville for Change

CommonHealth, Volume 5, Number 2Director: Benjamin DayEditor: Sandy EatonPhotography: Sandy Eaton, Katie Murphy, NNUProduction: Erin ServaesPrinting compliments of the Massachusetts Nurses Association

Representative Jason LewisIntroduces Professor Hsiao

Page 4: CommonHealth Newsletter - Fall 2011

UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE EDUCATION FUND ~ VOLUME 5, NUMBER 2 ~ FALL 2011

Mass-Care Helps Launch ‘Co-Insuranceis NO Insurance’ Campaign

Students must have insurance coverage to enroll in a college or university program in Massachusetts. However, unlike other residents who are required to purchase health insurance, they are banned from receiving state subsidies no matter how low-income they are. While many students are enrolled in their family health plan, 27% are either too old or their parents are uninsured, and must enroll into their college’s student health insurance plan (or SHIP).

For the past few years, colleges and universities have been reducing the actual coverage of SHIPs by introducing an increasingly high-level of co-insurance. Co-insurance means that students must pay 15%, 20% and sometimes 35% of the total cost of care in addition to the yearly insurance premium. For surgeries or other expensive forms of care, students can end up owing thousands of dollars. For low-income students who can’t afford these cost barriers, co-insurance effectively means no insurance, potential insolvency, more stress and a constant fear of getting sick.

To stop co-insurance from creating a two-tiered insurance coverage system among students, Mass-Care and a network of other organizations have taken action to ban its practice in the state of Massachusetts. Some of the organizing that has taken place include a ‘sick-in’ at UMass, a complaint filed with the Division of Health Care Finance and Policy to investigate the legality of co-insurance, and a symbolic ‘fundraiser’ held across the state to raise funds to help cover co-insurance expenses for low-income students in need of vital medical care. - Ibrahima Sankare, former Massachusetts PNHP Intern

Mass-Care Starts Multi-Year BigCity Campaign for Single Payer

Mass-Care has voted to expand its grassroots organizing efforts into large urban areas of the state including Boston, Worcester and Springfield. This is a multi-year campaign, the first year of which will reach out to organizations that are already fighting to preserve health care coverage or are struggling because of rising health care costs. Outreach to these groups will highlight the need for systemic reform while building a more diverse leadership base for the single payer movement.

Mass-Care has already begun working with student groups who are protesting the new co-insurance fees being added to their out-of-pocket costs. Other struggling groups include private sector attacks on benefits and bargaining rights (GE, Verizon), attacks on public employees’ health care (particularly municipal employees), immigrant groups’ access to  care, municipal governments that struggle with the rising cost of employee health care, minority groups that suffer from disparities and safety net institutions that are losing funding.

The goal is to build an active steering committee in each city, that is committed to supporting each group’s health care struggles through solidarity actions, but also committed to addressing systemic reform of the health care system. Mass-Care will need volunteers to develop linguistically and culturally appropriate educational materials, establish con-nections with the targeted groups, and develop a “story-based” speakers’ training program to empower new leaders for single payer. This is an exciting new campaign, so be on the lookout for opportunities to join in!! - Pat Berger, MD

You Can Help Mass-CareMass-Care is hoping to build a vibrant new coalition for single payer in the urban centers of Massachusetts. We need your help! We need funding for producing new educational outreach materials, setting up leadership training con-ferences, and running actions and forums to generate media coverage. We also will need volunteers to help in the organizing effort. To volunteer, please contact the Mass-Care office at 617-723-7001. Please be as generous as you can to keep Mass-Care growing!Students & Workers Rally in August for Healthcare Justice

Massachusetts Senior Action Council Leads the Way