By Donna Smith, communications specialist, California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee

NOTE:  CNA/NNOC will be highlighting 2008's Congressional candidates throughout the nation who we hold up to voters as our "healthcare heros." Lend your support, get involved and vote like your life depended on it... because it does.

WICKLIFFE, Ohio – What in the world is an RN doing in a race like this?  Well, ask Bill O’Neill, and this Vietnam vet, journalist turned judge and finally pediatric emergency department RN will tell you that when he is elected in November, healthcare reform will be center stage in his first term’s work.

O’Neill is running in Ohio’s 14th Congressional District, which is in the far northeastern corner of the state and borders both Lake Erie and neighboring Pennsylvania.  His candidacy embodies the spirit and energy of Ohio’s citizenry.

And plenty of Bill’s future constituents are hurting for healthcare.  

THURSDAY NIGHT IS HEALTH CARE CHANGE NIGHT: a weekly DailyKos Health Care Series

Transformation of our ailing health care system is a necessity apparent to every sector of American society but insurance companies and the current administration.  Some Senate staffers have privately suggested to me that by doing nothing, the Senate is making systemic collapse (and implementation of Single Payer) inevitable. Although Americans openly despise private insurers, we remain unable to pass HR 676, Conyers' effort to establish a national public health service.

Even if we elect a new President, if we cannot infuse the Senate with a fresh crop of progressive faces, we will again fail to replace a health care system that monetarily rewards the denial of care. Representative Jeff Merkley, an Oregon Democrat, is one candidate who will champion health care transformation. I had the opportunity to interview him for ePluribus Media and Daily Kos at Netroots Nation.  I will not pretend to be objective for the sake of this diary. The netroots should assist progressive candidates to win Senate seats.

More below the jump.

Not surprisingly, the healthcare reform debate has taken many twists and turns since the last real attempt at overhaul in 1993.  With more than 45 million people uninsured, and tens of millions more underinsured, the recent focus on universal coverage is not only laudable, but essential.  The efforts of longstanding universal coverage advocates were instrumental in achieving this and deserve our continued support.  In particular, in this forum, nyceve, California Nurses Association, and many others who make up the Netroots Nation have passionately and sensitively 1) highlighted the moral outrage and disturbing injustice of how the insured and insured alike are dealt with by insurance companies and our health care system and 2) translated this understanding into concrete advocacy and action.  

Advocating for universal coverage, however, is not enough. More below the fold.

By Donna Smith, American SiCKO,
Communications specialist, California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee

Tomorrow I'll have my third colonoscopy.  Twice before, precancerous polyps have been found and removed, so my schedule for testing is every three years.  That three years goes by way too fast.  I know the screenings are life-saving for many, but I still hate them.  And my hatred goes well beyond my dislike of the preps necessary.  

As a uterine cancer survivor and an insured American who was financially devastated after illness, my cancer checks are always fraught with a bit of trepidation and a lot of projecting.  

But private, for-profit insurance leaves me exposed -- and worse still, it leaves millions and millions of unsuspecting insureds wide open to financial ruin.  On the eve of my screening, this is what I think about.

What if I have cancer again?  What if the insurance doesn't pay for something? And then beyond... What if I miss work?  What if we have to move again?  What if the bills pile up?

America: land of innovation, of the can-do spirit, of Yankee ingenuity.

Americans were the first people in the world to declare independence from an empire -- and get away with it. Americans dug the Erie Canal, reversed the flow of rivers, invented powered flight and the skyscraper, harnessed the power of the atom, sent men to the moon and brought them back alive. We supplied the world with an abundance of food and high-quality manufactured goods. We defeated fascism, take credit for having defeated communism, co-founded the United Nations, absorbed tens of millions of immigrants and made a single people out of many. We are one goddamn amazing country.

Or at any rate, we were. Something happened to us around 30 years ago. Suddenly, things seemed so awfully difficult. Preposterous, even. Reducing poverty? Building a 200-mpg automobile engine? Signing the Kyoto Protocols? Manufacturing consumer goods domestically? Fighting crime and terrorism without recklessly abrogating civil liberties? Forget it. It's too hard. Too inconvenient. Too unprofitable. Too much of a hassle. Or it might mean that we had to follow the same rules as every other country, that our specialness didn't render us exempt.

We've turned into Emo Nation, for crying out loud.

This today from PSN's Adam Thompson on the right wing plan to "reform" health care by forcing folks into indivudal plans with high out-of-pocket costs:

As with John McCain's health care reform proposals, the Florida and Georgia plans are indicative of the Right's allegiance to "consumer-driven health care" - the idea that Americans will use less care if they must pay more out-of-pocket.  As the New York Times reports, Sen. McCain wants Americans to purchase their insurance in the volatile and costly individual market, eschewing the stronger bargaining power and better consumer protections found in employer-based and large group coverage.  The problem with this approach is that high out of pocket costs - which are the result of high deductible and limited benefit plans - lead consumers to avoid necessary care, resulting in worse outcomes and higher system-wide costs in the long run.  

By Donna Smith, American SiCKO
Founder of American Patients United
National Co-Chair, PDA Healthcare Not Warfare campaign
Communications Specialist, CNA/NNOC

CHICAGO – I read it moments ago.  In black and white.  Mainstream media.  CNN website.  It was said publically at a fundraiser in New York City today.  Sen. Barack Obama said it with Sen. Hillary Clinton at his side.  And no one denied it.  In fact, people clapped.

According to the CNN report, Sen. Obama urged today  "standing up for paid leave, and paid sick leave, because no one should be punished for getting sick or dealing with a family crisis."

For anyone paying attention to health care in the states, this article in the New York Times yesterday should come as a welcome relief.  The problem of health insurance for "high-risk" individuals is perhaps one of the most difficult and perplexing knots in the dilemma of trying to achieve coverage for the nearly 50 million uninsured people in the U.S.   Perhaps the best thing about this article is that it brings much needed attention to the difficulty that states are having and will continue to have in funding high-risk health coverage in times of increasing budgetary strains brought on by the energy and housing crises.

They love to tell us we live in the GREATEST COUNTRY ON EARTH... but like VICTORY IN IRAQ they never bother to explain what exactly that phrase means.   Greatest.... greatest what?  Greatest land mass?  Greatest economy?  Greatest quality of life?  Greatest number of millionaires?  Greatest concentration of wealth?  Greatest military power?  Greatest nuclear power?  

I think we all agree life here is generally good.  Certainly beats the crap out of Haiti or Yemen or Sudan or Zimbabwe.  Hell, we are nowhere near Nigeria in mortality rates (~20%) from botched abortions.  Here abortion is still legal and safe.   There it is illegal.  However, when I was growing up we set the bar a little higher.   We talked about the strength of our economy ... although we worried about the national debt.  We talked about the strength of our schools ... although we worried about the Russians and the Japanese.  We talked about our overall health... and didn't worry about much of anything.   Well, Russia has turned into a kleptocracy, Japan is suffering a long-term economic funk (after a real estate bubble like ours) and now we learn, life expectancy is decreasing in America for men and women...

By Donna Smith, American SiCKO, communications specialist, CNA/NNOC

CHICAGO – It’s a week of bad news for my friends and extended family.  I am almost afraid to answer the phone or open the emails.  Three people I care about. Three new cancer diagnoses. Bone, lung, breast.  Surgery, radiation and chemo coming down the pike.
 
And awash in a system gone mad for money, these patients will become cancer survivors – like me – not because they’ve been born with or bestowed with the human right to be treated when ill, but because their various health coverage plans allow it.  At least that’s what I pray today for them, because that's what I must pray for them.

Last week, none of these wonderful souls had any idea they would hear the words, "You have cancer." Each was ensconced in the stuff of everyday life: jobs, marriages, gasoline prices and watching the endless coverage of the presidential race.  Then their worlds did a three-sixty.

In an instant. It truly could be any one of us at any time.

My colleague David Sirota has a new diary today about the topic that's on just about everyone's mind where I work in NYC: what's going to happen now that stalwart Republican Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno is on the way out?

If you want to catch the most up-to-date dirt on the shady FBI investigation subplot to Bruno's exit or the swirling gossip around his likely successor, be sure to check out the Albany Project, which, as always, are keeping it on lock when it comes to tracking even the smallest minutiae of New York State politics.

However, if, like Mr. Sirota, you agree that Bruno's exit is a major opportunity for progressives to make a national impact through state-level, then you'll want to do a little more than that.  

The SICKO Effect Wears On and On and On:

June 19, 2008, National Day of Action Against Private Health Insurance Industry

While many of us attended the huge protest in San Francisco with pre-made signs and a Dixieland Jazz Band marching us in to the strains of "When the Saints Go Marching In" and a cheering crowd of thousands with press circulating and coalitions of activists grabbing the spotlight,  one of our American SiCKOs who is also one of our board members for American Patients United, held a very different kind of protest action.  By herself.  In Detroit.  Where Rep. John Conyers, D-MI, the father of HR676, The National Health Insurance Act, has his offices and where one would think a crowd would gather to cheer on a young woman of such courage, an American SiCKO stood alone.

The cost of my doctor visit yesterday: $85
The cost of my generic prescription: $39
The cost for an X-ray today: $75
My weekly pay: $350
The number of hours a week I work: 50

The cost of Health Care Reform: Priceless

I just read  drchelo's very moving diary about his/her work with a charity clinic and s/he mentioned that Thursday is "health care change" night at dailykos so I thought I'd share my story.

I spent 1995 through the fall of 2006 in the ranks of the uninsured. During those years I grew angrier and more frustrated over the state of health care in this country. I finally got health insurance late in 2006. That's when I really got angry.

Many people think Hillary Clinton has a better health plan than Barack Obama. She repeatedly tells voters her plan will cover everybody, while Obama’s will leave out 15 million people.

Data emerging from the 2006 Massachusetts health reform tell a different story.  The Massachusetts experience provides a microcosm of the problems likely with Clinton's universal mandate -- poor compliance, enforcement difficulties, unaffordable insurance premiums, and runaway costs.  Obama’s plan is more fiscally responsible and also more acceptable politically.

This past Friday night, I attended a Kansas concert in Greeneville, Tennessee.  In case you don't know who the band Kansas is, they are classic rock band whose biggest hit came in the 1970s and include "Dust in the Wind," "Carry on my Wayward Son," and "Point of No Return."  I had been asked to attend this concert by my father, who is close friends with the band's bass player, Billy Greer, who is from the same small town in East Tennessee that I am from.  I too am acquainted with Billy, and we have even played music together a time or two.

Anyway, I have been to several Kansas concerts over the years, I didn't realize that this was a benefit concert until my wife and I arrived at the show and read the program.  The concert was in fact a benefit for well renound, Grammy Award-winning guitarist, Barry Burton, who died recently after a long bout with leukemia.

Anything here look familiar to you?

There are many dimensions to the health care debate, too many to really receive deserved attention in the heat of a presidential campaign. A shrinking supply of general practioners, lack of access to care in rural and inner-city areas, inefficent redundancy of care, and out of control pricing, all come together in a Gordian knot that is our health "care" system today.

But it all boils down to a key problem for all Americans: it's harder and harder for employers to provide insurance.

•The percentage of all employers offering health insurance in the past eight years peaked in 2000 at 69% and has fallen steadily since, hitting 60% this year, according to an annual survey of employers by the non-partisan Kaiser Family Foundation. Among small firms of three to nine workers, the percentage offering insurance has dropped even more — from 58% in 2001 to 45% this year [2007].

•From 2001 to 2005, the number of uninsured U.S. workers rose by 3.4 million. Almost 19 million workers — 17% of all employees — were uninsured in 2005, according to the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured.

So those people who have employer-based insurance know how lucky they are, in one aspect. But many are trapped in jobs and professions that don't allow them to fulfill their potential because they can't risk losing their insurance. Detatching health coverage from employment is one of the keys to providing universal coverage. This is a key aspect of one of the proposals out there to address the health care mess we're in, Sen. Wyden's Healthy Americans Act.

Wyden is releasing this ad nationally. Hopefully it will contribute to the public debate on health care reform during this election and help provide the contrast on health care between the parties. The Democrats are working on solutions. McCain is pandering to his base.

Disclosure: I worked for Sen. Wyden when he was in the House, from 1987-1993.

Now that the furor over Spitzer's prostitution-prosecution scandal has died down and Governor Paterson has been sworn in, things can get back to normal in New York's Capital Region.  The region is home to the 21st New York Congressional District, where two amazing things are happening.

First, we have five announced candidates in a Democratic primary to fill retiring Representative Mike McNulty's seat, something that has never happened in the district before.

Second, out of all these five candidates, only one, Phil Steck, is distancing himself from the pack by joining local doctors and advocating for full, single-payer, universal health care.  He's doing this for two main reasons: first, because it makes sense, and second, because no matter who gets elected President this year, once we have the White House, we're going to need Congressmen who are able to push him or her to keep their promises.

More below the fold.