Healthcare

In America, the richest country in the world, home of medical marvels that have thrilled and enriched the world, health care should be a right, not a privilege. It is a tragedy that 45 million Americans have no health insurance. It is also a shame that millions more have been cursed with substandard or inadequate care, that does not provide preventative care or non-catastrophic care. Their only blessing is that an unforeseen illness will not end their life, it will only cripple their family and their way of life.Many of these are hard working citizens employed by small businesses that cannot afford an insurance plan. Seniors should not have to choose between prescriptions they need and putting food on the table. Families should not have to take their children to the emergency room for an ear infection when an early doctor's visit would have stopped it. Preventative care saves money and lives. It also increases the bottom line for businesses small and large. Healthier workers will lead to fewer sick days, more productive work hours and workers more likely to work efficiently and energetically with a consistently healthy condition. We can and must provide a health care system that renders useless the middlemen. The insurance companies, HMO's, PPO's, malpractice insurers and others steal from the system, provide inefficient service and promote shoddy and often incompetent care by doctors and hospitals. We must change the way health care works. A single-payer, universal system will provide competition as capitalism designed it. Profit will flow to those who provide the best service, not those who cut the most corners. We can and we must provide a guarantee that future generations will not want for medical care and research, as previous generations so often have.

Universal Health Care

We must make a careful, but rapid transition to a universal Health-Care system. For very little money overall, the immediate savings in overhead and administrative costs will go a long way toward providing every American with affordable health care.

Prescription Drugs

Click Here for a Funny video about a serious subject, Prescription Drugs.

Loopholes in prescription drug laws shall be eliminated, providing for foreign purchases, bulk purchases, and consumer flexibility in choice of drug plans. As has been seen on television, our pharmaceutical industry produces medicines that can change and prolong lives, make those lives easier, healthier and more robust. However, drug companies cannot be allowed to continue profiting on the fears of the public. We must work to curtail marketing that encourages people to take tens of pills each day, simply because those drugs are popular. Prescribing a drug should be the purvey of a doctor, in consultation with a patient. Advertisement for prescription drugs should be stopped, both to slow the rise in cost and to slow the consumption of “trendy” drugs that may not be needed.

Medicare and Medicaid

In the short term, we need to fund and preserve Medicaid and Medicare, both of which are efficient, successful programs. However, recent prescription drug coverage for Medicare recipients has been rendered confusing and sometimes ineffective, because of lobbying by drug and insurance companies. We must rewrite this landmark legislation, to spell out the benefits our elderly can receive, and to replace the prescription coverage in pension benefits, to streamline effectiveness and to further take the shackles off private industry growth. As we move to a Universal Health Care system, they will become unneeded, as every American becomes covered by the same program. The elimination of these two incredibly successful programs will also the growth of bureaucracy associated with the aging of our population.

Health Insurance

Businesses will no longer be burdened with providing health care for employees, which will free up growth opportunities. Currently, for every General Motors car sold, 1500 dollars of the price paid goes directly to healthcare for a retired GM worker. The care given to their retirees by American companies is admirable, however, with bankruptcies declared by American companies, such as Bethlehem Steel, Delphi and other big names, health and pension benefits begin to disappear for their retirees. Even if benefits are paid, they are assumed by the Federal Pension Benefit Guarantee administration. Single-payer health care, portable from job-to-job, will defray the cost and fear attached to employer health plans. All citizens should be able to receive the same health care plan that government employees do at an affordable cost. Families earning less than a certain yearly income will make very small co-payments -- perhaps only a token amount, while those over it can buy into the program at affordable rates.

Veteran's Healthcare

We must reverse the harmful cuts that this Administration has made in health care benefits to our Veterans, and increase the coverage available for all eligible veterans. This is particularly important with the current wave of soldiers returning from Afghanistan and Iraq with service-related injuries. For far too long have we rushed into war then abandoned our veteran's medical, mental health, and retirement needs. Thorough and proper care of our veterans, as well as those currently in military service, sends a message that we value and respect their work, and would not put them into harm's way for frivolous or financial motives. Our military force must be deployed efficiently, conscientiously, and only when necessary for our true national security concerns.

Healthcare Workforce

There is a shortage of Health Care employee's from doctors to nurses to nurse-practitioners, technicians and researchers in this country. We must provide those willing to work hard with an affordable education in Health Care Careers.

Research & Development

We must continue to fund basic research and development for the health sciences to facilitate bringing new medications and therapies to patients, but pharmaceutical companies that benefit from federal funding must be held accountable for the way they spend those grants. They must not waste it on exorbitant CEO salaries and fancy marketing programs.

Mental Health Parity

Mental Health problems can be as crippling as any physical malady, and can last for much longer periods of time. There are solutions to many mental issues, that can be extremely effective, once the social stigma of mental illness has been overcome. We must end discrimination in government and private care plans against those with mental health problems by providing them with adequate coverage.