Experts decry health system
Speakers at SR forum call for universal care plan to replace present insurance
October 20, 2002
By JEREMY HAY
THE PRESS DEMOCRAT
Experts at a forum Saturday in Santa Rosa pronounced America's health care system terminally ill and worse.
"It is a crazy and cruel system we are now struggling with," said Jack Glaser, senior vice president of theology and ethics for St. Joseph's Health Care System, the parent of Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital and Petaluma Valley Hospital.
Glaser was among two dozen speakers -- physicians, nurses, public health administrators and educators -- during a daylong forum at Santa Rosa Junior College. Though they differed on the formula, they overwhelmingly supported a universal health care system.
Past proposals -- including a California ballot measure in 1994 and a Clinton administration plan a year earlier -- have failed. But supporters of universal health care are closely watching Oregon, where voters next month will consider a proposal for the state to insure all of its residents.
"It's a new political climate," said Dr. Quentin Young of Chicago, national coordinator for the 10,000-member Physicians for a National Health Program, which advocates a single-payer government-financed system.
He said the present system's woes -- including 41.2 million Americans without health insurance, skyrocketing premiums for those who are insured, and soaring medical costs -- are "fertile soil" for change.
"The people are ready," said Mike Smith, a Sonoma Valley Health Care District board member and a lead organizer of the forum, "Health Care Crisis 2002: A Search for Solutions."
The conference was co-sponsored by the junior college and nurses belonging to Service Employees International Union Local 707. Its urgent tone was underscored by the collapse of Health Plan of the Redwoods, which declared bankruptcy in June and closes its doors this month, leaving about 64,000 people to find other coverage.
Speakers cited a variety of strains on the system, including low reimbursement rates from insurers and the government, and a shortage of skilled workers that leaves many in the health care field feeling overworked and demoralized.
In Sonoma County, they said, lower pay scales and higher housing costs have contributed to doctors leaving and nurses choosing to work elsewhere.
Those who remain must contend with a population where 11 percent of children and 14 percent of adults under 65 are without health insurance, further taxing the system, said county Public Health Officer Mary Maddux-Gonzalez.
Without systemic changes, many expect the problems to get worse.
"The stress on the health care system within the next decade will demolish it; it's an inexorable, inevitable demographic fact," said Santa Rosa physician Robert Dozor, referring to when the first of the 76 million-strong baby-boom generation qualifies for Medicare benefits in 2011.
About 200 people, many of them medical professionals, attended the forum, and among the audience and panelists there was a broad sentiment that health maintenance organizations and private insurance plans should be replaced with a system along the lines of Medicare, which covers all citizens over age 65.
"We need some sort of national care system," said Maria Angel of Sonoma, a government studies student at Sacramento State University who plans a career in public health policy.
Smith, from the Sonoma Valley Health Care District, said the time is ripe for change.
"The reason we don't have universal health care is because we don't have a broad-based movement to put fire under the politicians," he said.
Others warned that without a firm sorting of priorities, any movement will suffer.
"You cannot have everything," said Glaser. "If we cannot constrain ourselves to face that about health care ... we will not see this in 50 years."
You can reach Staff Writer Jeremy Hay at 521-5212 or jhay@pressdemocrat.com.