Health Care For Everyone In America

Democrats were recently attacked for not doing enough to prevent "illegal immigrants" from obtaining health care under the proposals now in Congress. FCAN supports health care for everyone in America, which includes those here without documents. I'll explain our reasons.

First, it is the right thing to do. We believe in taking care of our neighbors and those in need of care. We don't want anyone to suffer, for any reason. In fact, under current law, hospitals and doctors are required to treat everyone. Aside from the morality, I believe this is because we would want to receive the same care if we found ourselves in need.

Secondly, taking care of everyone is more efficient. The changes made to the legislation envision health care providers checking identity papers before providing care. Aside from the obvious difficulty from doing so in an emergency situation, it would mean creating an entirely new bureaucracy to prevent people from obtaining care. Insurance companies would be the clear choice to do the work, considering their experience. National identity cards would be needed to establish identity. This would diminish our freedom, and cause lots of additional expense solely for the purpose of denying health care to people that need it.

Thirdly, the charity care providers would still have to provide care. While the many clinics and hospitals that currently provide care to those without insurance look forward to the end of their missions with the advent of national health care, they might face simply shifting clientèle. That would mean scarce resources put back into health care that might have been devoted to other causes.

Undocumented workers are now paying taxes. Many of these workers use forged social security cards and have payroll taxes deducted from their checks. That means they are paying into Social Security and Medicare. The U.S. Social Security Administration has estimated that undocumented immigrants contribute approximately $8.5 billion in Social Security and Medicare funds each year. The U.S. Internal Revenue Service has determined that undocumented immigrants paid almost $50 billion in federal taxes from 1996 to 2003.

FCAN believes immigration problems are complicated and should be addressed, but attacking immigrants and denying them care is not only foolhardy, it is wrong.

Bauccus Bill a Failure

Washington, DC – Health Care for America Now (HCAN) – the nation’s largest health care campaign – released the following statement today on Senator Max Baucus’ health care bill.

Richard Kirsch, HCAN National Campaign Manager:

“The Baucus bill is a gift to the insurance industry that fails to meet the most basic promise of health care reform: a guarantee that Americans will have good health care that they can afford. The Baucus bill would give a government-subsidized monopoly to the private insurance industry to sell their most profitable plans - high-deductible insurance - without having to face competition from a public health insurer.

Under the Baucus bill, employers would have no responsibility to help pay for their workers’ coverage and would be given incentives to have workers pay more for barebones insurance. Americans who don’t get health benefits through work would still not be able to get good, affordable coverage.

We urge Senators on the Finance Committee to replace the Baucus plan with legislation that will do what the Senate HELP Committee and three House committees have done: guarantee that Americans have good health insurance that they can afford with the choice of a strong national public health insurance option.”

(FCAN is part of Health Care for America Now)

PSC in the mud again

The St. Pete Times editorializes today on the dirt coming from the Public Service Commission. Generous pay raises for PSC staff in hard times, Kentucky Derby parties, and coziness. Coziness??? Yes, the Times correctly says the PSC is way to close to the utilities.

When the PSC is in session, the Commissioners sit in front, and next there is a line of tables for their staff and utility representatives. Behind that barrier sit the consumers. Of course, mere consumers are not allowed to address the Commission directly. Fortunately, we do have an aggressive Public Counsel and some consumer groups like FCAN.

The room layout is just a symbol of how things are. The fact is, as the Times suggests, the PSC staff meets constantly with utility staff and hears their message every day. In the not too recent past, FCAN helped pass reforms to stop commissioners from taking gifts from utilities and from meeting privately with utility representatives. But now the staff seem to be the conduit for information. A recent commissioner was sanctioned for reading into the record a utility memo that he received from a staffer.

It is time to look again at doing more to clean up the PSC and restore the confidence of consumers. Commissioners can take action on their own, but it may take more legislative action to separate the PSC from the utilities.

If you want to have your say on being billed for nuke plants that you may not be around to see finished, or guaranteed utility profits above 10%, then you should email the PSC. I recommend writing directly to Commissioner Nancy Argenziano at Commissioner.Argenziano@psc.state.fl.us or call her at (850) 413-6038. I suggest Argenziano because she has listened to consumers and can be an advocate for us.