'08 AFFORDABLE HEALTH CARE FOR ALL

by Steve Young

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46 million Americans, including many of our middle-class working families, have no medical insurance. They are one major illness away from losing everything. This is wrong.
We each carry multiple policies of insurance that cover the same medical risks. Imagine the savings to each American and to our businesses if we did not have to pay for medical coverage in our home, auto, health, and liability insurance. Imagine what we could do if the multi-million dollar salaries and bonuses went into health care rather than insurance executives’ pockets. Imagine reforming and simplifying Workers Compensation, and our litigation system. No longer will fender bender accidents, or workplace accidents result in litigation because health care will be, by definition, no-fault. No longer will health care be an issue in contract negotiations between unions and management. Imagine a health care delivery system like Medicare and the Veterans Administration.
If you can imagine this, you are beginning to see why our present health care system costs too much and does not work. Washington has favored insurance companies, drug manufacturers, lobbyists, and health care bureaucracies at the expense of the American people. We need to put people first and guarantee every American the right to affordable quality health care. I will:
1. Support a national health care plan.
2. Eliminate tax breaks for drug companies that raise their prices faster than Americans’ incomes.
3. Guarantee a core benefits package that includes ambulatory physician care, inpatient hospital care, prescription drugs, basic mental health, and expanded prenatal, preventive, and long-term care. The package will be set by a health standards board made up of consumers, providers, business, labor and government.
4. Make health care a right, not a privilege, by giving employers and employees the right to buy private insurance or opt for a public package.
If You Are Ready to Put People First, Join Our Campaign for a New America.