Mayors join those lined up behind national health care

Another major group recently endorsed a federal bill that would expand the nation’s Medicare system to include everyone in America in a universal health-care plan.

The U.S. Mayors Conference, meeting in Miami in late June, voted for a resolution in support of HR676, also known as the United States National Health Insurance Act.

The resolution noted that 47 million Americans are currently without health insurance and that millions of others have coverage so inadequate that one major illness could lead to financial ruin.

The resolution also noted that:

• Managed care systems like HMOs and other so-called market reforms have failed to contain health-care costs, a situation that now threatens the international competitiveness of U.S. manufacturers;

• Administrative costs of private insurers consume one-third of private health-care spending while Medicare has administrative costs of less than 5 percent;

• U.S. hospitals spend 24.3 percent of their budgets on billing and administration while hospitals in Canada – which has a single-payer system – spend only 12.9 percent;

• Harvard researchers estimate that more than $300 billion could be saved annually by replacing private insurance companies with a single public-payer system;

The United States remains the only advanced nation in the world without universal health coverage while premiums for workers who get their health insurance through their employer – the vast majority – continue to rise by 10 percent, 12 percent or more every year.

And at the same time, private insurance companies continue to reap record profits. In 2006, the nation’s six biggest health insurers earned almost $11 billion in profits, according to ConsumerReports.org.

It’s a situation that can’t continue much longer, universal health-care advocates say. And it’s a system that business can’t carry much longer, according to Nathan Wilkes, a co-founder of the Business Coalition for Single-Payer Healthcare.

“Basically, everybody in the group – we all have different backgrounds in business and political leanings – but we all recognize the current health-care system is crushing business and it’s making us not competitive globally,´ said Wilkes, an Englewood resident who helped form the group in 2007.

Wilkes said his group helped formulate the message sent to the mayors that changing to a single-payer system would benefit them through cost savings to their respective cities by no longer dealing with multiple insurance companies, each taking their own profits, and by buying drugs and medical supplies in bulk.

“It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure that part out,” Wilkes said.

HR676, sponsored by Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., and co-sponsored by 70 other representatives, would basically expand the Medicare program – an existing single-payer plan now restricted to those 65 and over – to include every citizen. The bill has been endorsed by numerous medical organizations, including the National Medical Association and the American Nurses Association.

Others lining up behind it include several faith-based organizations, the Kentucky and New Hampshire houses of representatives, 20 cities and counties, the League of Women Voters, AFL-CIO organizations in 33 states and more than 400 labor groups across America, including the Boulder Area Labor Council and the Southern Colorado Labor Council in Pueblo.

Opposed by industry

So with all these groups coming together behind HR676, what’s keeping it from being enacted?

Wilkes says any real change in the current system is strongly opposed by the private insurance industry, big pharmaceutical companies and manufacturers of medical devices. “Anybody that’s making big profits today is against it,” he said.

Last year, Colorado tried to take a step toward insuring all of its residents – about 800,000 aren’t insured – through the 208 Blue Ribbon Commission on Health Care Reform. Five proposals were forwarded to the Legislature in January, including a proposal from Health Care for All Colorado that would have provided coverage for all through a single-payer plan.

Eliza Carney, chair of the Northern Colorado chapter’s steering committee, said she was “disappointed but not surprised” by the legislature’s failure to adopt any of the proposals.

Carney said financial constraints were part of the inaction but also a lack of political will.

“I think some of the (Democratic) legislative leaders were swayed by pundits who said it was a controversial issue and they would be hammered by the Republicans at election time,” she said.

Both Carney and Wilkes strongly support HR676 but say getting momentum behind a national health-care plan probably won’t happen without successful state-level programs. Both said they would like to see Colorado develop a pilot program that could serve as a possible prototype for a national health care program.

“It’s not going to happen without a lot of grassroots action,” Carney said.

Asked whether a change in the White House this year might increase HR676’s chances of passing in Congress, Wilkes said he holds out hope under a Barack Obama presidency.

“I’m always hopeful,” he said. “It’s definitely getting better for something like that to happen. I would love to see a situation where Barack Obama is president with a filibuster-proof Congress to finally pass a universal health-care plan.

“That would be phenomenal.”

Steve Porter covers health care issues for the Northern Colorado Business Report. He can be reached at 970-221-5400, Ext. 225 or at sporter@ncbr.com.

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