Archive for May 2009
The issue of political feasibility – Healthcare Reform
The issue of political feasibility is being questioned! Need you ask why?
Is there time to STOP this MADNESS? – Maybe!
Call or Fax Senator Max Baucus and tell him that SINGLE PAYER is indeed on the table & let him know Americans will not stand for a health insurance and pharma bailout! Phone: (202) 224-2651 (Office) // (202) 224-9412 (Fax)
And one more – Call President Obama at the White House, the Senator’s boss in this matter and tell him the same! Also tell him Single Payer is not for later, the time is NOW! // (202-456-1414 or 202- 456-1111)
Now – Please tell everyone you know to do the same…
Rick Scott / CPR Healthcare TV AD is BULL CRAP
Who is CPR and who is Rick Scott?
Go to FactCheck.org and see for yourself. Trust me, it’s worth the time to click and see! (link)
Is it not time to do something? Are you going to allow thief’s and those who commit fraud with your tax dollars be the very ones that dictate what your nations healthcare reform will be? You can STOP this!
Tell NBC & Meet the Press: Don’t Air Rick Scott’s Phony “Documentary”
To see how else you can HELP – Visit Healthcare-Now & the Physicians for a National Health Program
Donna Smith and Bill Moyers Give Max Baucus a One-Two Punch
50-City Single-Payer Events on May 30th
More Informative News:
Affordable Healthcare // Pharma CEO Saleries // Healthcare Fraud // Propaganda
Ready to Gamble with your Health?
New Game Promotes Single-Payer Reforms
When American patients trust their health to a for-profit insurance company, they’re doing nothing less than gambling with their lives in a game where the odds are stacked in favor of the insurance company.
Try your luck – play the game | Read the press release
TAKE ACTION for Real Healthcare:
Join thousands of single-payer supporters in a
nationwide week of action to support improved Medicare for all (HR 676).
View the calendar of events and get involved!
Posted for my Friends at:
California Nurses Association
National Nurses Organizing Committee
2000 Franklin Street
Oakland, CA 94612
www.CalNurses.org
~Do you need affordable and Real Health Coverage that protects your family? ~
Don’t believe the Lies – Ask a Canadian!
If you don’t believe this video either, just start calling Canadian folks! They do have telephones, and I’m sure you can google up some phone numbers… They will be happy to tell you how they feel about their Single Payer Healthcare system! Make sure to also ask if they would prefer our, “for-profit” American system!
Senator Max Baucus – Health Ins & Pharma’s Whore
Not only is Healthcare Reform going to be more of the same, it will likely get worse if Senator Max Baucus has his way. He seems to have the authority to push forward ignoring the majority outcry of health professionals and citizens…
Senator Baucus also raised the idea of taxing health benefits at the May 12th Senate Finance Committee Round Table. In response, Gerald Shea, Assistant for Government Affairs to AFL-CIO President John Sweeney, deemed Baucus’ proposal to tax health benefits a “radical change” and said, “If we’re going to do a radical change, I think that single payer is really the way to go.”
While Senator Baucus continues to say, without offering any evidence whatsoever, that single payer is “(not) going to work in this country”. Do you need to ask why? Senator Max Baucus really represents the powerful and wealthy health insurance and pharma industries.
The Senators Career Campaign Contributions:
From the insurance industry: $1,170,313.
From the health professionals: $1,016,276.
From the pharmaceuticals/health-products industry: $734,605.
From the hospitals/nursing homes: $541,891.
From the health services/HMOs: $439,700.
May 30: National Day of Action
Events Being Planned Nationwide
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Day of the Dead
By Cindy Sheehan
Single Payer News… Thank You Steney Hoyer!
Please take a minute of your time to call and e-mail Majority Leader Steney Hoyer to say THANK YOU for him saying that Single Payer should be “on the table” …
Phone: 202-225-3130 // e-mail (link)
SINGLE PAYER – Is in a DO or DIE position!
“The pace is quickening.” – Rep. John Conyers, Jr
Friday May 22nd – Bill Moyers’ Journal Discusses Single-Payer
This Friday, Bill Moyers’ Journal discusses single-payer healthcare.
Guests include Donna Smith (California Nurses Association), Dr. Sidney Wolfe (Public Citizen) and Dr. David Himmelstein (Physicians for a National Health Program).
You can look up the dates/times for your area here.
If you just-by-chance do not know about the Single Payer Heathcare Reform movement, I suggest you watch this show! If you want a brief overview, watch this video first! (link) If you like what you saw in the video, please learn how you can help to make this a reality – time is CRITICAL! Visit the Healthcare-now and The Physicians for a National Health Program web sites.
PLEASE HELP!
Senator Max Baucus, just another DC Pimp!
Max Baucus is the Democrat Montana Senator known for passing George W. Bush’s tax cuts in 2001. He was rewarded with a prime spot at the signing ceremony in the White House… This really helped the Middle Class. NOT!
Two years later, it was Max Baucus who helped Republicans pass a pharmaceutical-industry-friendly Medicare prescription-drug bill! This bill allowed the pharma industry to rape all the seniors, our tax dollars and sent pharma’s profits through the ceiling…
Many in his party were shocked about Baucus position at the helm of the Senate Finance Committee. The legislative man-in-charge for just about everything that Barack Obama hopes to accomplish; from healthcare reform, rewriting the tax code, to global warming… Should anyone be surprised? Max is right up there up with his “republican colleagues” in stealing from the poor and middle class to aid the ultra rich…
So it should not be a surprise to anyone including President Obama when healthcare reform becomes another shining example of the same. The health insurance and pharma industries will be laughing all the way to the banks!
Healthcare and banking bailouts with your tax dollars!
Just where is our democrocy?
Healthcare Reform? Bend Over America…!
Middle Class Healthcare Reform? Bend Over…
by Donna Smith
It’s coming. You and me and every middle class, working person in this nation is about to start handing over more and more of their hard earned cash to the private insurance industry, courtesy of our own elected members of Congress and our very popular President. Fire up those Treasury Department presses. We’re going to be printing and providing money for insurance companies like no bail-out we’ve seen yet this economic crisis cycle.
The healthcare legislation under design and so far under wraps for the American people is slowly being leaked via carefully staged forum and meetings and a few well-timed hearings and grand press announcements. Much of the work is still going on behind closed doors in private meetings attended by those who are deemed appropriate participants and industry friends.
Remember how open these proceedings were to be following all the Clinton plan debacles of the early 90s? Well, today’s stagings are far more sophisticated and planned out. So learning did occur by the industry giants and their political friends over these last 17 years, I will give them that.
And what do we know so far about what middle class Americans can expect from the legislation being privately crafted?
First, no matter what percentage of your take home pay it takes, you will be legally required to buy private health insurance. Second, if all you can afford is a policy that leaves you financially exposed to bankruptcy and foreclosure, then you will still be legally required to purchase that private insurance product. Third, should you fail to buy a policy, you will pay a fine.
Like it so far? Feeling free and protected? Like the choices so far? It gets better. (Read the rest, you won’t like it either…)
Is there time to STOP this MADNESS? – Maybe!
Call or Fax Senator Max Baucus and tell him that SINGLE PAYER is indeed on the table & let him know Americans will not stand for a health insurance and pharma bailout! Phone: (202) 224-2651 (Office) // (202) 224-9412 (Fax)
And one more – Call President Obama at the White House, the Senator’s boss in this matter and tell him the same! Also tell him Single Payer is not for later, the time is NOW! // (202-456-1414 or 202- 456-1111)
May 30: National Day of Action
Events Being Planned Nationwide
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Pharma Watch – PR Scam / Do you trust them?
The Health Care Industry’s PR Scam: Will Obama Fall for It?
— By James Ridgeway /MotherJones.com/ May 11, 2009
In a much-anticipated statement today, Barack Obama announced what is largely a public relations end-run by the health care industry, designed to trim a few scraps off of the nation’s porcine health care budget, while preserving its basic system of medicine for profit.
In a letter to Obama that was released over the weekend, executives from the Advanced Medical Technology Association (the medical device manufacturers lobbying group), the American Hospital Association, the American Medical Association, America’s Health Insurance Plans, and the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, as well as the Service Employees International Union, pledged to “do our part” to reduce health care costs. Their vague, pie-in-the sky promise amounts to just a 1.5 percent reduction in the growth rate of health care spending. Such is the explosion in health care costs that even this miniscule reduction represents a potential $2 trillion saving over 10 years. But there’s no guarantee this figure will be achieved. As the Washington Post points out:
The groups did not spell out yesterday how they plan to reach such a target, and…they offer only a broad pledge, not an outright commitment….In addition, White House officials said, there is no mechanism to ensure that the groups live up to their offer, only the implicit threat of public embarrassment.
Do you honestly believe you can trust anything these people say? See for yourself how they conduct business… Fraud & deciet!
May 30: National Day of Action
Events Being Planned Nationwide
~ Did you know there is an all natural, cost effective cure is availbale for MRSA ~
Senator Max Baucus is on who’s payroll?
He takes money from the industry and does their bidding
The Senators Career Campaign Contributions:
From the insurance industry: $1,170,313.
From the health professionals: $1,016,276.
From the pharmaceuticals/health-products industry: $734,605.
From the hospitals/nursing homes: $541,891.
From the health services/HMOs: $439,700.
Baucus’ Raucous Caucus
By Amy Goodman // truthdig.com
Barack Obama appeared this week with health-industry bigwigs, proclaiming light at the end of the health-care tunnel. Among those gathered were executives from HMO giants Kaiser Foundation Health Plan and Health Net Inc., and the health-insurance lobbying group America’s Health Insurance Plans; from the American Hospital Association and the American Medical Association; from medical-device companies; and from the pharmaceutical industry, including the president and CEO of Merck and former Rep. Billy Tauzin, now president and CEO of PhRMA, the massive industry lobbying group. They have pledged to voluntarily shave some $2 trillion off of U.S. health-care costs over 10 years. But these groups, which are heavily invested in the U.S. health-care status quo, have little incentive to actually make good on their promises.
This is beginning to look like a replay of the failed 1993 health-care reform efforts led by then-first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton. Back then, the business interests took a hard line and waged a PR campaign, headlined by a fictitious middle-class couple, Harry and Louise, who feared a government-run health-care bureaucracy.
Still absent from the debate are advocates for single-payer, often referred to as the “Canadian-style” health care. Single-payer health care is not “socialized medicine.” According to Physicians for a National Health Program, single-payer means “the government pays for care that is delivered in the private (mostly not-for-profit) sector.”
A February CBS News poll found that 59 percent in the U.S. say the government should provide national health insurance. (Read the whole story)
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Actor Mike Farrell at Capitol Hill Rally for Single Payer Healthcare!
Not only was Mike Farrel in Washington at the Capital Hill rally today, he also appeared on the MSNBC // Ed Show. If you have the time – Ed & Mike are great, watch the video… (link) Mike Farrel is advocating for a Single Payer Healthcare system.
Your support is needed! Please HELP
Call or Fax Senator Max Baucus and tell him that SINGLE PAYER is indeed on the table & let him know how much you “respect” his performance! Phone: (202) 224-2651 (Office) // (202) 224-9412 (Fax)
And one more – Call President Obama at the White House, the Senator’s boss in this matter and tell him that the Senator respects us! Also tell him Single Payer is not for later, the time is NOW! // (202-456-1414 or 202- 456-1111)
~ Did you know there is affordable help available for MRSA ~
Senator Max Baucus – Again Arresting Doctor’s & Nurse’s !
Five single-payer protestors arrested Tuesday, May 12, 2009
By Ken Strickland // MSNBC
Five protesters were arrested this morning at a Senate hearing on health-care reform. The protesters — some, who identified themselves as doctors and nurses — were be charged with “Disruption of Congress,” according to the Capitol Police spokeswoman. The Senate Finance Committee hearing was a roundtable discussion between senators and experts on the best way to pay for health-care reform.
As the hearing opened, about 25 women, who identified themselves as nurses stood up, turning their backs to the senators. Taped to each of their red shirts were signs that called on Congress to pass what’s called a “single-payer system,” a system in which the government alone would run health care — no private insurance.
“Nurses say patients first,” the signs read. “Pass single payer.”
After standing silently for about five minutes, the nurses walked out of the hearing in an orderly fashion. They were not escorted by police. But shortly after the group left the hearing, more vocal individual protest began. A person stood up and in a screaming or loud voice, called for Congress to pass the single-payer system.
“We want guaranteed health care,” one said. “We’re tired of private insurance.”
Within a minute or so, a police officer escorted the protester out of the room and arrested them in the hallway. This sequence was repeated four more times, ending with the arrest of each individual.
Lobby & Rally Tomorrow in Washington
~ or ~
Call or Fax Senator Max Baucus and tell him that SINGLE PAYER is indeed on the table & let him know how much you “respect” his performance! Phone: (202) 224-2651 (Office) // (202) 224-9412 (Fax)
And one more – Call President Obama at the White House, the Senator’s boss in this matter and tell him that the Senator respects us! Also tell him Single Payer is not for later, the time is NOW! // (202-456-1414 or 202- 456-1111)
Join National Nurses for Single-Payer !
Join National Nurses for Single-Payer
Healthcare for Everyone in America!
National Nurses Week: May 11-15, 2009
FAX THE SENATE FINANCE COMMITTEE: Protest the exclusion of RNs and DEMAND a real policy debate in a future hearing, including single-payer experts!
LEAVE A VOICE MESSAGE FOR THE SENATE FINANCE COMMITTEE: Call the Health Justice hotline to have a message delivered directly to your Senator. When you call this number 1-800-578-4171, state where you live and that you want a single-payer expert in the Senate Finance Committee Roundtable on May 12th. The messages will be delivered as voice messages but will also be transcribed and delivered by fax on monday. Call NOW! 1-800-578-4171.
Dear Single-Payer Friends:
It’s National Nurses Week and there are many single-payer festivities in Washington DC. Help us celebrate the leading role nurses play in the single-payer movement by joining us in Washington DC and / or making a call to get single-payer experts into the Senate Finance Committee Roundtable discussion!
This Tuesday, May 12, the Senate Finance Subcommittee is holding its final roundtable on healthcare reform. The California Nurses Association / National Nurses Organizing Commmittee has issued a request to include Roseann Demoro, Executive Director of CNA / NNOC and longtime leader in the single-payer movement. PNHP has formally submitted the names of two outstanding physicians, Drs. Marcia Angell and Steffie Woolhandler, to testify as expert witnesses. These voices must be heard. Nurses and doctors are on the front lines of our broken health care system, and they should be the first in line to testify on health reform.
As you probably heard, at the last Senate Finance Committee hearing, physicians and single-payer advocates stood one-by-one to ask to have a seat at the table. The Senators laughed and had each one arrested. We need to end the exclusion of the only plan that will be truly universal and contain costs. Our health depends on it.
Here is what you can do: Single-Payer New York met with Senator Schumer, member of the Senate Finance Committee, on Friday evening. He agreed to ask Chairman Baucus to include a single-payer expert if we can get another Senator on the committee to join him. If you are a constituent of the following Senators, you can call and ask them to join Senator Schumer [NY] of the Senate Finance Committee to ask Senator Baucus to include a single-payer expert in Tuesday’s Hearing:
Stabenow [MI] – Washington DC office 202-224-4822
Kerry [MA] – Washington DC office (202) 224-2742
Rockefeller [WV] – Washington DC office (202) 224-6472
See a full list of Senate Finance Committee members here!
If you are not a constituent of Senators on the Finance Committee, please call Sen. Baucus’ office in Washington and urge him to extend the invitations at (202) 224-2651, or fax him at (202) 224-9412.
Thank you for your support at this critical time in our nation’s health!
Healthcare Justice for Everyone in America!
California Nurses Association
National Nurses Organizing Committee
2000 Franklin Street
Oakland, CA 94612
www.CalNurses.org
www.GuaranteedHealthcare.org
~ Please HELP, your heath depends upon it! ~
Mothers Day!
Thanks Much Mom’s!
Hope the day was good…
Pharma Watch – Be Informed! ~ FRAUD
Fake Merck Journal Printed by Elsevier
Pharmaceutical giant Merck paid science publisher Elsevier to put out a fake peer-reviewed scientific journal called Australasian Journal of Bone and Joint Medicine. Elsevier is also the publisher of Health News Daily, The Gray Sheet (coverage of the medical device industry), The Pink Sheet (coverage of the prescription drug industry) and The Green Sheet (a publication for pharmacists)m which raises the question: What did Elsevier know, and when did it know it? // more
Forest Reserves $170 Million
Forest Laboratories has set aside $170 million to settle a False Claims Act case related to the kickbacks paid to doctors for off-label prescription of the antidepressants Celexa and Lexapro to children as well as the off-label marketing of Levothroid. Forest notes that “there can be no assurance that the amount reserved by the Company will be sufficient and that a larger material amount will not be required.” // more
WellCare to Pay $80 Million
WellCare Health Plans has agreed to pay $80 million to settle charges the company inflated Medicaid charges in Florida. The settlement only applies only to Florida, and does not settle any other state or federal investigations of WellCare. // more
Be an informed consumer! Don’t believe for one minute that the Pharma industry has your best interest in mind… Making you well does not generate profits. Visit the Taxpayers Against Fraud web site (taf.org) to see just how many of the companies that you thought, you could trust with your health, that are committing fraud. They are fined enormous dollars that get passed back to you, the consumer!
~ Did you know there is affordable help available for MRSA ~
Ed Schultz MSNBC – Single Payer, WHY OFF “The Table” Senator Max Baucus?
Ed Schultz speaks with Dr. Margaret Flowers of Physicians for a National Health Program about whether single-payer is on or off “the table” and what it’s like getting arrested by Capitol Hill police…
I am so pleased that Ed Schultz of MSNBC did this story! Thank You Ed & MSNBC, you might actually restore my faith in some US media…
Call or Fax Senator Max Baucus and tell him that SINGLE PAYER is indeed on the table & let him know how much you “respect” his performance! Phone: (202) 224-2651 (Office) // (202) 224-9412 (Fax)
And one more – Call President Obama at the White House, the Senator’s boss in this matter and tell him that the Senator respects us! Also tell him Single Payer is not for later, the time is NOW! (202-456-1414 or 202- 456-1111)
Joint Effort 