Notes and cases for:

Events and meetings

read the news, oh, boy

Links:
ecology
social justice
grassroots
peace/nonviolence

local area political directory

 

 

 

talking points on why we need a new health care
system in Michigan:

Our current system of health care financing is failing. We say that in light of the following:

  • 45 Million people in the United States, and over 1,400,000 Michigan citizens are without basic health care coverage. These figures have been growing each year, and there is no end in sight.
  • Our employer-based system adds to the costs of goods and services and reduces the global competitiveness of Michigan businesses.
  • It leaves an increasing number of people who have been laid off, in these hard times of the "jobless recovery", without basic health care coverage.
  • Medical costs are the second largest reason for personal bankruptcy in the United States, second only to job loss itself.
  • We spend huge sums on our health care system in the US, but fall behind in basic measures of health, such as life expectancy and infant mortality, while we leave 1/6 of the citizens lacking basic health care coverage.
  • Nearly 20,000 of our US citizens die each year of conditions that were left untreated due to lack of access to health care. In what is still the world's wealthiest economy, that is nothing short of criminal.
  • We spend 25% to 30% of every health care dollar on administration. While critics of government programs cry "bureaucracy," our present patch work system is difficult to administer, expensive, and takes time and resources away everything, including sometimes even from the practice of medicine.
  • With the money that we spend on health care in Michigan, we could provide affordable and comprehensive coverage for everyone in Michigan, if we would just spend this money wisely and fairly!
  • In fact, we could well save money. At least, this is the calculation of activists in California. SB 840, the California Health Insurance Reliability Act, will cover every Californian with comprehensive health insurance and give them the ability to choose their own physician. This model is estimated to save $8 billion, in the first year alone, in statewide healthcare spending. It will save money for families, businesses, individuals and local governments

It is for all these reasons that we launched the Green House Universal Health Care Initiative. Currently, however, our readers are referred to MichUHCAN (See http://michuhcan.tripod.com) Hopefully, the initiative to bring universal health care to Michigan can be re-started. First, the health care crisis is hurting Michigan as much as anywhere. But more significantly, the Michgan constitution states in Article 4, section 51 that the public health of the people of the state is a matter of “...primary public concern.” Also, MCL 325.2001 says that there is supposed to be a statewide plan to provide “...adequate access to health care for all segments of the state’s population.” These two measures were the basis of a lawsuit filed by the Michigan legal team to compel the state to come up with such a plan. The judge in the case threw it out, but hopefully a higher court will one day reverse that decision.

We need broad citizen participation in this battle, if we are going to succeed. What we want you to do is get your organization, city council, county commission, or business on our side. We need youto get them to pass a resolution calling on Governor Granholm to establish a commission to study health care financing and propose recommendations so that all citizens shall have access to a system that is:

closed hospital, Hamtramck
  • affordable and efficient
  • promotes prevention,
    education, and early intervention
  • provides continuity of care
    and protects consumer choice

Email the webmaster with your questions, suggestions, and comments