Public Health Insurance Option in Health Care Reform Bill
Ask your senators, via email and phone, to include the option of public health insurance in the Health Care Reform Bill. This would offer more choice, as the public plan would not cross off existing private insurers. Read Mary-Carol’s legislative action statement below:
Dear AMSA,
The Senate just returned from recess on Monday and square on the agenda is a big Health Care Reform bill that has yet to be fully written. One of the more important aspects of this reform process is over the inclusion of a “public health insurance option”. This is what it says, a plan run by the federal government (much like Medicare), that people have the option of buying much as they would buy a private insurance plan.
This public plan would, as our Legislators are describing it, exist alongside the private plans like Aetna and Blue Cross/Blue Shield. The legislation is on the Congressional drawing board right now and the public plan option is the contentious issue - many opponents are saying it should be on the Congressional chopping block. AMSA supports the creation of a single, country-wide risk pool of patients, funded from one budget, but right now, we’re not going to have any say at all unless we weigh in as this Nation’s future physician workforce with our support of the public insurance option at a minimum.We need your help to let your Senators know that you want your future patients to have the choice of a public health insurance option. Join AMSA members across the country today, Thursday April 23, to contact both of your Senators.
- Mary Carol
Will the public health insurance option take us a step closer to single payer? Perhaps so. But, the first thing congress and people at large must agree upon is the underlying principle that health is a human right. Without agreeing on this unshakeable foundation, health will still remain a commodity.
About The Author
Susan Lewis
Susan Lewis is a second year medical student at Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science, Chicago Medical School. She has been president of her school PHR chapter for two years. Susan has participated in AMSA's PharmFree Conference, Global Health Leadership Institute and Integrative Medicine Conference. She plans to pursue a career in community/primary care medicine, focusing on eliminating health disparities, especially among the marginalized and indigenous population, within the context of integrative medicine. Her lifetime goal is to become an informed and compassionate contributing member of the global society and local community, in which she may continually gain and give passion for healthy, harmonious and whole living, within all facets of life. Susan is also a writer for her university newspaper and is a regular contributer of FM Mag, an independent culture magazine from Denver, Colorado. She joined Global Pulse in 2009.
Other posts bySusan Lewis
Author his web sitehttp://www.globalpulsejournal.com
Have you seen anything in the written world about how the US health system’s growing pains play out in terms of influence on international policy? I’m thinking about potential effects of US health reform on funding, power balance between governments and pharmaceutical co’s, paradigms in policy thought, and so forth, and looking for a good analysis somewhere. The classic example is the RAND Health Insurance Experiment of the 1970s influencing two or three decades’ continuity of Western thinking about moral-hazard economics and cost-sharing in healthcare, ultimately influencing structural adjustment programs that were tried out in developing countries receiving American dollars.* (With decidedly mixed results.) If we are truly on the cusp of major reform, we should be giving some thought to implications and tie-ins beyond US borders.
* See two or three decades’ worth of World Bank documents, Congressional reports, and various policy papers.