Doctors support single-payer plan
HOWARD A. GREEN, M.D.
Palm Beach Gardens
Palm Beach Post Letters to the Editor
Friday, September 05, 2008
The writer of “Government health-care systems not the nirvana many Americans assume,” was correct in his analysis that the health-care systems instituted in France, Spain, Portugal and Canada would be sub-optimal for Americans, even though each of these foreign health plans results in lower levels of morbidity (sickness) and mortality (death) and are higher-rated for quality and accessibility of care than the current American health-care system.
American health care is now largely delivered via a government-subsidized private health insurance industry operating parallel to and within Medicare. A recent nationwide poll of physicians published in the Annals of Internal Medicine utilizing the AMA physician database demonstrated that 60 percent of doctors support a single-payer national health plan based on the most efficient and effective Medicare system.
This national health plan currently before Congress (HR 676) would provide medical care and low-cost prescription drugs to all Americans - including the 47 million uninsured and 50 million underinsured citizens - while maintaining the private-practice quality of physicians, hospitals, clinics and therapists.
The lower overhead costs of the most efficient Medicare insurance plan, which already treats more than 40 million people, would provide substantial cost savings to all Americans and businesses while maintaining quality private physician practices and hospitals. A majority of physicians in this country can’t be wrong in their support of a single-payer national health insurance plan such as HR 676.
Editor’s note: Howard A. Green is the director of the Dermatology Division of St. Mary’s Medical Center, a member of Physicians for a National Health Plan, and managing partner in Dermatology Associates PA of the Palm Beaches.