The only wa insurance companies can b3e allowed to stay in health care is if our government provid3es an alternative to private insurance. Only then will there be REAL competition in the marketplace (right now, "strangely", there is virtually NO difference in either cost or benefits of health insurance in the United States. Further, $.38 of every dollar spent on health care in the U.S. ($1.5 trillion /year, goes to insurance company "overhead").

The insurance company lobby almost succeeded in getting single payor healthcare "off the table". Every pain  patoient needs to contact their congressional representatives to demand that it be kept "on the table".
Dr. Hochman
---Wednesday 10 June 2009

by: Kevin Zeese, t r u t h o u t | Perspective

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Single-payer health care. (Artwork: Public Citizen)

    Editor's Note: Kevin Zeese is a former Independent candidate for US Senate in Maryland. He was one of 13 single-payer health care advocates who stood before a Senate panel chaired by Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, a Montana Democrat, and demanded that a voice for single-payer health care be allowed to participate in the hearing. Baucus refused, and all 13 who stood demanding to be heard were arrested and removed from the hearing room by Capitol police. - ma/TO

    Less than a month after 13 single-payer advocates were arrested protesting the exclusion of single payer, it is at the table in both Houses, making progress while the multi-payer pro-insurance reform is faltering.

    When we started our campaign one month ago to put single-payer national health insurance on the table, we were ignored.

    When we stood up and demanded that single payer be part of the debate, we were arrested.

    Today, single payer is breaking through, while the multi-payer pro-health insurance reform is faltering.

    Here's the news, single-payer national health insurance will be at the table in the Senate with a witness participating in a hearing this Thursday. And on Wednesday, a hearing is being held on single payer in the House of Representatives.

    The Senate Committee on Health, Education and Pensions has invited Margaret Flowers, M.D., of Physicians for National Health Policy. to testify this Thursday at 3:00 PM in a hearing on health care reform. Flowers was one of the Baucus 13 I was arrested with three weeks ago protesting the exclusion of single payer from Senate Finance Committee hearings.

    And on Wednesday, the Health, Employment, Labor and Pensions Subcommittee of the House Education and Labor Committee will hold a hearing titled "Examining the Single Payer Health Care Option" on June 10 at 10:30 AM in 2175 Rayburn House Office Building, Washington, DC.

    Single payer is making advances while the multi-payer pro-insurance industry reform bill is faltering.

  # There are deep divisions over how to pay for the reform with the very unpopular taxing of health benefits now being considered. This was something President Obama opposed during the 2008 campaign. Paying for single payer is much easier as the waste, fraud, abuse and bureaucracy of the health insurance industry - totaling $400 billion annually - would be applied to providing health care. Single payer pays for itself while multi-payer will add to the deficit.
  # Mandating that people buy insurance or face fines, another provision President Obama opposed during the campaign, is gaining popularity among pro-insurance company legislators. And, the mandates would provide subsidies to the poor so they can purchase insurance - of course, this is also a subsidy to the health insurance industry. The working class which cannot afford to purchase insurance will feel the burden of this requirement. Under single payer, people are provided health care without these costs, which is one r