National Health Care Call In Day Monday Dec 22

December 22: Call Congress on National Health Care

From: Frank Llewellyn - National Director, Democratic Socialists of America

The Leadership Conference for Guaranteed Health Care is a nationwide effort to support HR 676, legislation introduced by Rep. John Conyers, which is essentially a Medicare-for-All/Single-Payer Health-Care bill. DSA supports HR 676 and the Leadership Conference. We urge members and friends to participate.

The goal of this call-in day is to reach every Congressional office by having massive numbers of individuals and groups call the home district offices of their members of Congress on Monday, December 22nd. The point of these calls is to ask your members of Congress to sign on as sponsors of HR 676. If you don't know who your representative is you can find out by clicking here. If you need help finding your representative's local contact information you can look it up on the House of Representatives or U. S. Senate Web Sites. It is also possible to contact your representative through the Congressional switchboard 202-224-3121, although Congress is not in session now. Newly elected representatives can generally still be reached through their campaign offices.

In addition to your own representative, please call Senator Ted Kennedy's office at 617-565-3170. He is preparing health care legislation. Tell him that you support Conyers' bill, HR 676, and that the Massachusetts plan is not a good model nationally as the coverage is neither comprehensive enough nor affordable.

DSA supported single payer health care 15 years ago when health care dominated the political agenda; and now with reform possible in this new administration, it's the perfect time to again urge those who will lead our country and our states to support the best plan for achieving genuine national health care. Single payer national health care is an important part of DSA's Economic Justice Agenda.

During this past election campaign, health care reform was again a hot topic, and a lot of promises were made. Now as we transition to a new administration, the discussion continues as the President- and Vice President-elect, along with members of Congress, begin to set priorities. As the economy worsens, with close to two million workers losing their jobs in the past year, more and more families are losing their health care coverage. So this issue cannot be simply placed on the back burner.

With health care cost inflation soaring, companies are dropping their increasingly expensive health insurance plans and self-employed individuals find insurance almost impossible to afford. A tragic fact of our failing system is that at least half and perhaps as many as 68 percent of personal bankruptcies are due to extraordinary medical costs.

Single payer health care addresses the fundamental problem with our health care system -- the absolute need to control costs while providing quality care for everyone. According to Physicians for a National Health Program, streamlining our country's system by paying through a single non-profit entity would save more than $350 billion per year.

Some believe that we should accept that the "best we can do" is a mix of public/private health care and maintaining the insurance industry's role in a universal health care plan. This in fact may be what Congress is able to negotiate, but we need to outnumber our opponents, who are funded by the health insurance industry, and provide a voice for true comprehensive, universal health care for all.

The obvious fact is that the stronger our movement for single payer national health care is, the more likely we are to get a good plan out of the new Congress. That is one reason why getting additional sponsors of HR 676 (the bill number will be the same in the new congress) is important. The more supporters we have in Congress the better our chances!

Several more call-in days will be scheduled as the new Congress gets organized; we will be sure to keep you posted. Thanks for your help on this important issue.