Friday, January 2, 2009

They Can't Stop Talking About Health Care

The discussion on health care that the Obama Transition Team called for around the country has started a conversation that is continuing long after the meetings themselves ended.

My email box has been the recipient of numerous emails from people who couldn't make any of the events in Livingston County, Michigan, but who still wanted to share their stories and concerns.

From a lawyer came a comment about medical malpractice and how to prevent it. He noted that hospitals where doctors are employees, malpractice is much less frequent.
"With physicians being employees, there is far better organization and business and quality decisions can be better made and enforced," he noted.

A woman who has been laid off twice this year learned her coverage will run out on February 19 and that it would cost her $1,0005 a month for her family to pay for it herself. "Needless to say unemployment benefits will not even begin to cover a thousand dollars a month. So I think we will be joining the ranks of the uninsured.
Anything President Obama can do will be an improvement over this," she wrote.

Another woman wrote that the quality of care too often is sacrificed for profit as insurance company rules aimed at cutting costs handicap doctors. And she worried that doctors over-prescribe medications because of kickbacks they receive from pharmaceutical companies.

What has been interesting about the emails is that these came not from activists but from people whose names I don't recognize and who felt very strongly about the issue. They wanted to contribute their two-cents but for one reason or another they couldn't make the meeting.

Clearly, the Obama Transition Team tapped in to something very emotional, very important, for millions of Americans.

We need to help them answer people's prayers.

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