Before I present the facts I want to ask one important question? Why is it that so many Americans have been worked into a fervor that they do not trust the government in managing a public health care program - when in fact we have been doing so fairly successfully with Americans enrolled in the Medicare program for how many years?
Yes, there are some problems in Medicare such as fraud, but that can be fixed and is being fixed. And then there are those proclaiming we don't need another socialist program. Good Lord, look around, what do you think mass transportation provided by governments, welfare programs, grants the government gives to states just to name a few - what do you think these things are if you want to go by the definition of a socialist state. It is convenient for the political right and some moderate Democrats in this country to use the socialist fear tactics when in fact we already have many socialist type funding programs in this country, but we don't want to call them that because we want them. Many are called PORK BELLY projects that these same politicians are holding up as important in their districts, but instead refuse to use common sense and honesty to resolve of our health care crisis in this country.
As you read the facts below, please use some common sense and realize that we must have a national health care program and in my opinion, profit and GREED need to be take out of the health care system because folks, that is what has been causing this crisis whether you want to accept it or not.
THE FACTS
- $2.5 trillion will be spent on healthcare in the U.S. in 2009.
- By 2018, it is estimated that $4.4 trillion will be spent on national health
care expenditures in the U.S. - more than double the 2007 spending.
In 2007, $480 billion was paid to the top ten profit profit making health insurance companies in addition to another $500 billion in employee matched contributions and another $10 billion from individuals. This is nearly $1 trillion plus anually.
A recent study by the Urban Institute shows that based on the effects of the recession alone (not job loss), it is projected that nearly seven (7) million Americans will lose their health insurance coverage between 2008 and 2010. The study also stated that if unemployment reaches 10 percent, another six (6) million Americans will lose their health insurance coverage. This is already occurring. Taking these numbers together, it is conceivable that by next year, 57 to 60 million Americans will be uninsured. This is totally unacceptable in the richest country in the world who consumes 25% of the energy in the world, but only has one-tenth of the total population of the world. The Urban Institute estimates that under a worse case scenario, 66 million Americans will be uninsured by 2019. In addition, nearly 90 million people - about one-third of the population below the age of 65 spent a portion of either 2007 or 2008 without health coverage.
Without health care reform, small businesses will pay nearly $2.4 trillion dollars over the next ten years in health care costs for their workers. What is more disturbing is that 178,000 small business jobs will be lost by 2018 as a result of health care costs, $834 billion in small business wages will be lost due to high health care costs over the next ten years, small businesses will lose $52.1 billion in profits to high health care costs and 1.6 million small business workers will suffer "job lock", meaning that only roughly one in 16 people wiould be currently insured by their employers.
National health spending is expected to reach $2.5 trillion in 2009, accounting for 17.6 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP). By 2018, national health care expenditures are expected to reach $4.4 trillion—more than double 2007 spending.
The study further showed that nearly 1.3 million full-time workers lost their health insurance in 2006. Over 8 in 10 uninsured people come from working families - almost 70 percent from families. 30% between 1 and 7 in the family.
- The percentage and the number of uninsured Hispanics increased to 32.1 percent and overall to 15 million in 2007.
The number in increasing uninsured Americans is attributable to these factors:
Even if employees are offered coverage on the job, they can’t always afford their portion of the premium.
Health insurance premiums have increased 119 percent for employers since 1999.
Employee spending for health insurance coverage (employee’s share of family coverage) has increased 117 percent between 1999 and 2008.
Rapidly rising health insurance premiums are the main reason cited by all small firms for not offering coverage.
Health insurance premiums are rising, approxmiately 12.5% a year for the last ten years.
- Profits at 10 of the country’s largest publicly traded health insurance companies rose 428 percent from 2000 to 2007.
In 2007 alone, the chief executive officers at these companies collected combined total compensation of $118.6 million - an average of $11.9 million each. That is 468 times more than the $25,434 an average American worker made that year. Moreover, the health insurance industry invests more in buying back its own stock and rewarding its shareholders than in improving system operations, reducing premiums, or in developing ways to pay doctors and hospitals fairly.
According to CMS, Medicare and Medicard Services, payments to Physicians has steadily been increasing. 7% percent in 2004. In 2005 payments to Physicians increased 9.5% over 2004. From 2005 to 2007, it increased another 10.4%. Since 2004, Physicians have seen an increase in payments to them of nearly 31%. What are the Physicians complaining and worrying about? They have been a leading cause of this economic spiraling costs of health care.
This graphs shows the increases and what areas these increases have been seen.
- In 1965, out-of-pocket expenses made up 44% of health spending, private insurance made up 24 percent, and federal
outlays constituted 11%.
- By 1980, out-of-pocket expenses decreased sharply to only 23% of health spending, while the proportion of federal
health spending increased to 28%.
- In 2000, the proportion of out-of-pocket spending had fallen to 14% of total health spending, and federal outlays made
up 31% of heath spending.
Currently, the proportions of health care spending are even more weighted toward federal spending and private insurance (33% and 35%, respectively); out-of-pocket expenses are now equivalent to state and local contributions (12%). Total federal spending has grown, on average, about 12% per year, about twice as fast as out-of-pocket expenses, which are growing at an annual rate of about 6.5%. Private insurance grows at about 10% per year; and state and local spending grows at about 9%.
This graphs shows the increases and what areas these increases have been seen.
Medicare spending for prescription drugs grew 19.7 percent in 2005, and although it outpaced overall Medicare growth, it represented only a 1.2 percent share of total Medicare spending and does not include expenditures associated with the full Part D prescription drug benefit, which did not begin until January 1, 2006. This large increase is due to the aging baby boomer generation retiring and going on Medicare. Drug companies have made record profits since 2006 with the implementation of the Medicare Part D prescription drug plan.
In 2008, Americans shelled out $694.4 billion in out of pocket expenses these same insurance companies would not cover. The wealth of this baby boomer generation is disappearing.
Health insurance companies are spending $1.5 million a day to convince the you, the public, that a public health are program is not an option. Why is that? And that does not count the money being spent on lobybing in Washington daily which is estimated to be nearly a million dollars a day.
Every million that these health insurance companies are paying out to defeat the health care public program option are millions that these health care insurance companies that are in business to make a PROFIT are NOT spending on the care of their insured clients.
In several recent polls, 33% to 36% of Americans are in fear of losing their health insurance over the next 12 months. They are fearful because of all of the disinformation and literal lies being told by interests groups because of GREED.
- The problem is only going to get worse, people are living longer - the problem is, we cannot stay on this same path of the current health care system in this country - we have been on it for too many years!
This graphs reflects how Americans are living longer due to new treatments being discovered.
- Did you know that President Truman. 44 years ago, was the first President who sought to create a Universal Health benefit program that resembled systems in Europe.
Last month, the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development issued the latest in a long series of reports on the U.S. wasteful and cruel practices that ought to awaken a sense of national embarrassment for this country, but it has not. We are the laughing stock in the world regarding our health care system.
A recent OECC report documented the gross "discrepancy" between the enormous amounts that Americans spend on healthcare, paying into profit making health insurance companies and the actual value received for that expenditure. The study found that the United States ranks poorly among OECD countries on measures of life expectancy, infant mortality and reductions in "amenable mortality," meaning deaths "from certain causes that should not occur in the presence of timely and effective healthcare." What is being missed in this discussion of healthcare in the developed world is what is stated this study: "Among the OECD's 30 members -- which include Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, the Slovak Republic, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom; there are only three lacking universal health coverage. The other two happen to be Mexico and Turkey, which have the excuse of being poorer than the rest."
However, until the onset of the world economic crisis, Mexico is now on the way to providing healthcare to all of its citizens under a Universal Healthcare Program. Hopefully now, pregnant Mexican women will stop crossing the border to have their babies here in the United States in Emergency Rooms. Why? Because of the give borth her ein the U.S., their child becomes a U.S. Citizen that then qualifies for welfare and the Mother can now stay in the U.S. as well under welfare.
In one border Texas-Mexican city, even to this day, emergency rooms are being visited on an average daily where 3-5 Mexican women are crossing the border illegally who are near childbirth. They cross illegally into emergency rooms in this country to have their children on U.S. soil. And this is just one such city near the border. It is estimated that daily, approximately 100 Mexican illegal women are crossing the border daily and giving childbirth in the U.S. This has got to stop. Is this why the Mexican population in this country has increased to 27% in the last ten years?
A law needs to be passed that under circumstances like this, the child DOES NOT become a U.S. citizen and entitiled to welfare benefits. The mother and child needs to be shipped back to Mexico where they belong. An no, I not a racist person. I have many friends who are hispanic and black, but they came to the U.S. legally.
And I really need to comment on this concerning something else that has been a thorn in my side for years. Why are we spending tax dollars on printing all governement documents, election notices, hospital notices in both English and Spanish? Is it not a requirement to be a U.S. citizen that you must read, write and speak ENGLISH. Why is America becoming a bi-lingual country? Isn't our official language ENGLISH, and is so, why are doing this? Could someone please tell me?
In the OEDC report, the data shows the rest of the facts that are being ignored. It gets worse as the details emerge from this report. In this report, these are the findings:
- Public share of health expenditure in the United States is much lower than any
other OECD country except Mexico.
- Public expenditure on healthcare in the U.S. is much higher per capita than in almost all OECD countries.
FACT: Americans pay a lot more in taxes devoted to medical care. This does not include insurance premiums, co-payments, fees, and other health costs. Americans taxpayers pay MORE than in 27 countries that have universal coverage.
FACT: The U.S. public expenditure provides coverage only for the elderly and some of the poor (through Medicaid and the SCHIP program for children) while other countries provide universal coverage while spending less. How much less you ask?
Nations with comparable standards of living like France, Germany, Sweden, Finland, the United Kingdom, Canada, Norway, and Japan spend roughly between half and two-thirds per capita what Americans spend annually. In these countries, everyone is coverered and their results are measurably better health care.
All this right wing negative hype and even by some moderate Democrats who say the downside of universal coverage, such as lack of access to sophisticated medical technologies is a bunch of 100% mis-information, dis-information. And what is very disturbing it is believed by many of you in this country. Here are the FACTS:
Japan has a lower per capita health expenditures, ( and universal coverage ) than the United States and its citizens have greater access to MRI machines, CT scanners and kidney dialysis equipment than Americans do.
The grossly inflated and poorly managed U.S. health budget results from a variety of pathologies and illnesses. There is a greater prevalence of obesity and other chronic illness, a powerful pharmaceutical lobby that keeps prices high, and the profit-making imperative of the private insurance companies that have dominated the American health policy now for more than four decades after the U.S. established universal coverage for the elderly, ( MEDICARE) and the poor, ( MEDICAID).
The United States can no longer afford to provide quality healthcare for all of its citizens in an era of diminished resources -- unless we look to the example of other democratic states around the world that have had universal health coverage for sometime. Leaders and even their citizens in these countries realized that healthcare is a public good and a human right, the domination of private interests must be eliminated - profit MUST BE TAKEN OUT OF HEALTH CARE in a corporate sense of making the almighty dollar at any cost, including denying benefits and care to their insured.
- MYTH/LIES: Death Camps - euthanasia
FACT: The lunatics that are talking loudly about this are idiots. There is NOTHING in the health care reform bills pertaining to euthanasia. The word even isn't used. There are no death camps. Good grief people, are you not aware there is a Federal Law preventing euthanasia. Again, the right wing stirring up people with a bunch of lunacy and chosing the right people that don' t have much intellgence to know they are being used to spread these lies and myths. The only thing mention in any of the bills, it simply talks about doctors should have programs/options to patients to talk about end of life care. PERIOD! It simply gives a suggestion that Doctors should TALK and advise about their patients concerning wants about how they want their care to be in their end of life. Have Americans lost their common sense by listening to these idiots whose only reason for making such ignorant statements is to derail this process and further dumb down Americans to their level of stupidity - or is it stupidity on their part - could this be done on purpose?
- On what planet do you spend most of your time on?
Recently, U.S. Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) was asked by a woman at a town hall meeting holding a sign with President Obama altered to look like Hitler why he supports the President's "Nazi policy" on health care reform, he responded, "On what planet do you spend most of your time?"
Thank you Mr. Frank! We need more politicians need to call it like it is and reject these extremist fear-mongering.
The right-wing mobs intent on infiltrating congressional town halls and spreading conspiracy theories and lies should be called out for what they are: extremists and hate-mongers who are an obstruction to reasonable and informed debate.
Rep. Frank went on to call the town hall disrupter's "picture of the President defaced to look like Hitler" and her comparison of the effort to increase health care to the Nazis "vile, contemptible nonsense" and told the woman, "trying to have a conversation with you would be like trying to argue with a dining room table. I have no interest in doing it."
Yes, this woman had a right to express herself because that is what freedom of speech in this country is about, but please, can we stop the lunacy on this very important issue that must be finally dealt with in this country? Please, let's stop this nonsense and lunacy because that is what it is pure and simple - complete lunancy.
- MYTH: Doctors, hospitals, insurance companies and drug companies say they fear that their revenues would
shrink significantly and patient care could be diminished.
FACT:Having a Universal Health Care program, run by the government, and eliminating profit making health insurance companies, hospitals, MRI imaging and lab companies and coverning everyone would increase revenues to Doctors - but they don't see it that way. Why? STUPIDITY and lack of common sense. Drug companies would also see an increase with more people patients being treated. So who does that leave out of the picture and who has been controlling and blocking a Universial Health Program in this country for the last 40 years - the private profit making health insurance companies. Hello - COMMON SENSE please is needed here!
The American Medical Association has a long history of being opposed to legislation that threatens the status quo. The AMA opposed the creation of Medicare more than 30 years ago.
Doctors and the AMA complain that a government-run insurance program that looks like and especially pays like Medicare they are against. Medicare pays doctors 80 percent of what a profit making insurance company pays. If you have a public plain that pays like Medicare, the doctors are going to get a 20 percent pay cut. Not so, all one as to do is look at other countries that have Universal Health Programs and many of their Doctors not counting specialists are making the equivilent of $175,000.00 to $300,000.00 a year, more if a specialist, whereas in the U.S., most medical students coming out of medical school the last ten years are straddled with a $250,000.00 or more school loan debt and even working overtime are only making on an average of $150,00.00 a year in the U.S. Keep in mind what I've already disclosed, Physicians have seen increases of 31% in payments to them since 2004. Hello, MYTH AGAIN and GREED is being used as the fear tactic here by whomever to stop the creation of a Universal Health Care program in this country.
America’s Health Insurance profit making companies have clearly staked out their opposition to any kind of government-run health plan. They state it would have an unfair advantage. Its' members say they would be driven out of business as the government uses its purchasing power to demand much lower prices from doctors and hospitals. Karen Ignagni, the Chief Executive of the Association, has severely criticized the government’s track record in running Medicare as a good reason not to expand government health insurance beyond the elderly and disabled. She recently told Congress, "the program has done a poor job in taking care of people when they are very sick. Medicare has not effectively coordinated care, addressed chronic illness, or encouraged high performance.
This statement is simply not true. Yes, Medicare has had problems over the years, does fixe upper limits of payments to Physicians and Medical Services, however, this had to be done. I already showed you where since 2004 Physcians have increased and made 31% more since 2004. The services in taking care of the elderly and the poor has improved greatly over the last few years under MEDICARE and MEDICAID. The problem here again, we have more and more qualifying for MEDICAID as the unemployment grows.
- FACT: This has to do with money and GREED.
If there was more money available such as a Universal Health Care Program by eliminating profit in health care - and by covering every one, businesses would see reduced health care costs, Americans would see lower monthly health insurance preminums being paid into a Universal Health Care Program and benefits and services would improve because of mere numbers and efficiency. Don't you get it people. This has to do with GREED. We simply should not have a profit making health care system! Life is NOT about profit. Let me say that again, life and the care of life MUST NOT BE about making a profit and that is exactly why we are in this mess today with our health care. We have let profit making corporations in the health care industry for 40 years control your health care.
Isn't it about time that we as Americans take control of our health care and the only way to do that is through a Universal Health Care Program in this country - and not a profit making health insurance business or hospital controlling our health care? Hospitals should be run by our Universities or my local communities as a non-profit entity.
John C. Lechleiter, the Chief Executive of the drug maker Eli Lilly & Co., recently told a meeting of business leaders that American doctors and patients need to retain the ability to make choices based on the real value of treatment options. Understand one thing here, the drug companies are wary of the government’s pull in demanding lower prices for their products than the insurers they deal with today. The more government intervention you have, the less payment you have to make for your drugs folks. Simple common sense is needed here to see how prevasive this have become by certain interests in this country controlling health care. Does that explain why every major drug company has been against any Universal Health Care program in this country for 40 years.
- Despite the healthiest economy in the last thirty years, more than one-sixth of the people under the age of 65 are uninsured. Five years after President Clinton's ambitious universal health care initiative failed, the ranks of the uninsured has grown by more than a million a year, reaching 48 million adults and 15 million children who do not qualify for Medicaid. Most of Americans are doing their best in low paying jobs. However, many make just over the amount allowed for getting MEDICARD. They are being penalized for not being on welfare. So where so they get health care. Do we need this kind of incentive to go on welfare. This is what the current system promotes. Many Americans get sicker, wind up losing their jobs and then can qualify for MEDICAID. How crazy is this? Could this happen to you? Never say never!
The additional cost of providing comprehensive care to all Americans would be less than 1/20th of current health expenditures of $2.5 trillion a year we are spending now on health care, because a large portion we are spending on is for treatments of serious dieases, not preventable care and this will change to prevenatble care when EVERYONE is insured! Don't you get it people? It is the 45 million adults and 15 million children that are not insured that are not receiving preventable care that has been one of the driving forces that has driven up the cost of health care in this country because they don't have access to preventable care and wind up in health facilities with serious health problems. Add in the 428% increase in profits the insurance corporations have made in the last five years, there is your answer of what has caused the soaring health care crisis in this country. And preventable care and a Universal Health Program must include dental care. Do you realize how many health problems are caused by not have proper and regular dental care. Everything from kidney disease to heart diease. I have had nurses tell me of people coming into emergecy rooms with abcessed teeth that is also causing their kidneys to failing and many wind up with permanent kidney damage. A dental cavity can cause a blood infection that can cause damage to the heart muscle as well. Hello - do I need to spell it out any simpler?
FACT:According to 2008 CDC data health care costs associated with heart disease and diabetes alone in the U.S., $448.5 billion or 52% of total U.S. health care costs is spent on heart disease and $174 billion or 20% of total health care costs spent in the U.S. is spent on the treatment of diabetes. ( Be sure to read the information below on the new documentary, inGREEDients about this ).
FACT:The large profit make health care companies make billions off the current health care system and are contributing millions to politicians to make sure we don't end up with Nation Health Care.
A National Health Insurance Prohram is paid for with taxes that replace premiums. BUT, the taxes WOULD BE lower than what most people already spend on the current health care for a bad system. For example, the Danish health system (currently the most popular in the world) costs only 6.7% of GDP compared to our 13.6% of GDP. At half the cost, the Danish cover everyone. Hello ....the U.S. spends twice the cost and we leave 48 million adults and 15 million children uninsured! What I am trying to get people to understand here is this. If we had a national health program tax, but did not have to pay health insurance preminums to profit greedy insurance corporations, the taxes would be LOWER than the preminums that businesses and individuals are paying now and EVERYONE would be covered! THAT IS FACT - IT HAS BEEN PROVEN IN OTHER COUNTRIES THAT HAVE DEVELOPED A NATIONAL HEALTH CARE PROGRAM AND ELIMINATED PROFIT MAKING INSURANCE COMPANIES!
- MYTH - You will lose your insurance, coverage and benefits you have.
- FACT
You will not lose any type of coverage. Benefits of a Universal Health Care Program are designed from a cross section of all existing benefits that are being provided from current insurance programs including MEDICARE. Actually benefits would increase and actual out of cash expenditures will be less. If profit making health insurance companies are eliminated - the coverages and benefits are standard across the board. You will not pay more, you will actually pay LESS as given in the examples, the country as a whole will pay less for MORE and BETTER health care! This is not rocket science by any means because it has already been done in other countries, but most importantly, the bottom line is, the U.S. cannot stay on its' current health care system - IT WILL BANKRUPT the country. Why? Because profit must be taken out of the health insurance care business - it is the GREED that has gotten us into this mess.- FACT: Over 25 cents of every health care dollar is wasted on paperwork, advertising, and multimillion-dollar CEO salaries and other things patients neither need nor want.
As for the much-criticized health care system in Canada, let me point out the facts:
Canada's health care costs made up only 3 tenths of their GNP in 2008, whereas the U.S. was almost two and half times that. Their life expectancy is greater than ours and they have less numbers of serious disease states being treated per that of population percentanges. For some reason though, our infant mortality rate is slighty greater than theirs. I believe this is because more Canadian mothers are much younger than the average mother in the U.S. and do not care about their bodies and health while carrying the fetus. One thing Canadians do not believe in, if an infant is born with multiple life problems, they do provide extraordinary critical care life saving measures such as heart and lung machines to keep the infant alive. They let nature and God takes its course.
The MAIN problem in Canada and also England where they are having the same problem concerning waiting lists is not because they have a Universal Health Care Program - it is because they have a shortage of Doctors, Nurses, Lab Techs and Medical Technicians to run the MRI's, Catscans and other medical devices. Canada started going through a baby boomer retiring problem seven years earlier than us. England nearly ten years earlier than us. There simply is not enough DOCTORS to go around in these countries and folks ---guess what regardless what we do with health care in this country - you better get prepared - we are going to have the same problem in this country in five years when the baby boomer generation really starts retiring and goes on MEDICARE.
Canada has a population smaller than California. Approximately 830,000 Canadians are currently waiting to be admitted to a hospital or to get treatment, according to reports. In England, the waiting list is 1.8 million. Why is this? In Canada they only have one Doctor for every 3,000 or so patients. In England, it is worse, only one Doctor for every 4,500 people. The U.S. is quickly approaching those numbers as baby boomers are retiring. We have a shortage of Doctors in this country and Congress was warned about this 20 years ago. Why do you think they are allowing these Doctors from India and Pakistan into the country to practice medicine without having to fullfill a residency at a hospital? Our health care is only going to get worse unless this more important issue of a shortage of Doctors, Nurse and other medical personnel is addressed in this country - however, I'm afraid it is too late. It takes 8 years for a Doctor to go to medical school, fulfill a residency before he can open up shop and also be indebt of over $250,000 by that time.
In Denmark, the government pays the tutition of those wanting to be Doctors or Nurses. In addition, they pay people to become Doctors and Nurses approximately $600 a month to become a Doctor or Nurse in Denmark. When Denmark first started this many years ago, they had people moving to Denmark from other countries who, became citizens to get this FREE medical education. What they found was, many of these people would then move back to their countries and Denmark after getting their medical degrees. Denmark realized that unless they changed this they would have a shortage of Doctors as well. They changed it to receive this FREE medical education they had to be born in Denmark. This is what we must do in the U.S. That is why in Denmark they do not have this problem and why they have the best Universal Health Care Program in the world. By the way, Denmark banned hydrogenated oils several years ago because they knew the dangers they posed to the human body. Why is it that in America we are the last to correct something that is damaging? I will tell you - GREED!
What angers me about the politicians in Washington is they are not addressing this critical issue and have ignored it for twenty years when they were warned about this problem then in different reports and studies done on this problem. Those are the cold hard facts folks - but are any of these politicans talking or addressing this problem? No, they are only addressing the issues by the special interests groups that donate to their campaigns.
I'm sorry, but I also believe that if an infant is born with serious illnesses, extraordinary means should not be taken such as heart and lung machines to keep the infant alive if the outcome is poor and the child is going to be left mentally damaged. For example, a woman in California gave birth to a premature baby that had multiple heart and lung development problems, in addition to having physical deformaties. At the cost of nearly one million dollars, ( tax payer dollars because the woman was an illegal immigrant and on welfare ) over a 6 week period this infant was kept alive by artificial means and then the infant died.
Do not get me wrong, all life is precious, but I 'm sorry, when such an infant is born, extraordinary means such as this when there were so many problems, expensive extraordinary means should be utilized or spent. Let God and nature take its course here. This has been the problem in this country because of the profit driven mechanism of our health care system. We have promoted a life saving agenda regardless in cases like this of the cost. Why? GREED - because in this case the profit making hospital can bill the state for keeping the infant alive. And for another reason, people because they think medical technology can do anything have forgotten that there is what is called a "quality of life" and who is going to care for these people as adults and who is going to pay for that care?
We must re-evauluate our thinking pertaining to such thoughts and practices and use common sense. There is no way this infant was ever going to survive and if by some miracle it did, who was going to pay for the care of this person from an infant into an adult. Right now in this country, we have over 250,000 such individals that are on various welfare problems costing states hundreds of millions of dolllars annually. Most of these individuals are also basically brain dead requiring constant medical care as adults. Yes, we must keep our human compassion, but we also need to simply let God and nature take its' course at times and not prolong life that really should not be prolonged. We have got to stop playing God in this country about life and death pertaining to such individuals. Leave it up to God.
I want to close with this statement after giving my opinon above.
There is a time to be born,
A time to Live,
And then there is a time to Die....
But what we do in between is what is important.
This is what I see as the problem. Most people spend their entire lives not accepting that one day they will die. They live their lives as if they are going to live forever and that is why I believe we have the many social problems in the world today and especially in the U.S. today.
We have gotten away from values in this country. The majority of Americans I believe have been so dumb downed by all the advertising, marketing, politicial hype and lieing to the American public because the fact is, this country is being controlled by the corporations whether Americans want to admit that or not. Because of that, the quality of life in any area, including especially health care will wain and vary. It is apparent that it is this mentally in how health insurance companies have gotten away with denying treatment, converage etc. of their insured and even cancelling a policy when a person gets cancer.
Life is about living and in the U.S. - following the American Dream, but my Americans I ask you this, whose dream it is really --- your dreams or are the dreams being created for you so what you can have is dictated by profit making companies that have taken control of your life from birth to death?
We need to start using common sense in this country again, stop allowing the corporations to control our politicians in passaging legislation that only puts us deeper into the controlling clutches of these corporations. From that statement , some will now say, "Oh Dewey, he is a conspiracy nut." My reply to those is, no, I am an American who believes in why our forefathers started this country 200 years ago.
Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.
My Americans, do we have that today, especially regarding our health care reform crisis?
I asked you to search your heart and soul, read what I have written and I feel that if you truly get the message I am trying to deliver, you will pick up the phone and start calling you Congressmen, write letters and cry out the message that you want a Unverisal Health Care Program in this country and you want the profit making health insurance companies eliminated - period ! And that you want all medical facilities, hospitals, imaging services be NON-PROFIT entities owned by non-profit hospitals. Do you know that some of the best well run hospitals with the lowest rate of increases in costs and improvement in care and services are non-profit hospitals. Hospitals need to be owned by local communities, not corporations what demand a 25% return on their dollar.
Please email and call your friends, family. Share with this article with them and get them to do the same with others. One voice can become millions and effect CHANGE. Our present health care system cannot go on, it will not survive, those are the facts, accept the truth America, things MUST CHANGE for the better and that is another problem, people don't like change. What has amazed me over the years is, Americans want the government to provide this and that, pay for this and that, they want everything nor nothing Well America, the problem is you have been sitting on your laurels for too many years while your country has been taken over by corporations who by contributions keep these politicians in office to do their bidding. IT IS TIME FOR CHANGE!
I emplore you to do this, because I am afraid if you do not, you will one day wish you had. Over the years I have written well in advance about the dangers of hydrogenated oils, global warming, the oil crisis and when I did,many thought I had lost my mind. The problem was, all I was doing then as I am doing here is presenting the facts and the truth. I have come to the conclusion almost that the problem is many people do not want to deal with the facts and truth - rather they act like lunactics - because by accepting the truth and facts - they then have to deal with it and they may have to give up something or make a change they don't want to do. Why? selfishness. Let me ask you this, if you were told that by you simply donating $1 dollar a month, and every American donated $1 dollar a month that it would provide to the 15 million children in this country health and dental care - would you give that one dollar a month? Our children are our future, we must take care of them for if we don't, who when we are old and need care - who will take care of us?
I end this column with this from Segway inventor Dean Kamen who thinks the ridiculous debate over healthcare reform in Washington is largely missing the point. In an interview with Popular Mechanics editor-in-chief James Meigs and deputy editor Jerry Beilinson, Kamen told the magazine:
"We now live in a world where technology has triumphed, in many ways, over death. The problem with that is that it's enormously expensive. And big pharmaceutical giants and big medical products companies have stopped working on stuff that could be extraordinary because they know they won't be reimbursed, according to the common standards. We're not only rationing today; we're rationing our future. "
"If you project forward these horrific costs of treating everybody and you want to assume we are not going to respond to that by making the therapies better, simpler and cheaper and in some cases completely wiping out the [diseases], well you know what? We might actually get to that situation - if we stop investing in technology, if we stop believing that the future ought to be better than the past."
"If somebody in this country wants to explain to me that we ought to be spending about twice as much supporting sports as on all of our pharmaceuticals, then stop spending. I think this debate shows a fundamental lack of vision, a lack of confidence, a lack of understanding of what's possible."
I think it may be time to replace the entrenched corporate controlled politicians in Washington with leaders of vision - do you?
Please read about the new documetary, inGREEDients, below. Purchase the DVD, watch it, share it with family and friends - it will save your life and theirs - especially your children!
And last, please visit former Vice President Al Gore's website and learn how you can help to stop global warming:
AlGore.com Official site taking the message of 'An Inconvenient Truth' to Congress.
ClimateCrisis.net Official An Inconvenient Truth: Global Warming Effect Wesbite - Learn about Al Gore, Global Warming Truth, Causes, Effects & Facts Pertaining To Climate Change That Is Real!
~ God Bless
David Lawrence Dewey
Sources of information in this article:
U.S. Budget Office
GAO Accounting Offices
CMS Medicare and Medicaid Services
OECD DATA and STATISTICS
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
Make sure you read about the new documentary
Read About the Film - Click Here
Do you want to die young with a diseased heart?
Develop needless high blood presure?
Develop diabetes type II ?
If not - then you need to watch this new documentary !
THE FILM HAS WON FIVE FILM AWARDS !
Do you care about your health, the health of your children, your family?
Then make sure you read my column:
Hydrogenated Oils - Silent Killers
Learn the truth about these deadly oils in our food supplies
Read about Greta Ferebee's and my efforts in a nationwide petition campaign to get these and other toxins out of the food supply. VISIT our website:
- Despite the healthiest economy in the last thirty years, more than one-sixth of the people under the age of 65 are uninsured. Five years after President Clinton's ambitious universal health care initiative failed, the ranks of the uninsured has grown by more than a million a year, reaching 48 million adults and 15 million children who do not qualify for Medicaid. Most of Americans are doing their best in low paying jobs. However, many make just over the amount allowed for getting MEDICARD. They are being penalized for not being on welfare. So where so they get health care. Do we need this kind of incentive to go on welfare. This is what the current system promotes. Many Americans get sicker, wind up losing their jobs and then can qualify for MEDICAID. How crazy is this? Could this happen to you? Never say never!