September 14, 2010
Dear PNHP members and friends,
Good news!
Economist and international single-payer expert Tsung-Mei Cheng of Princeton University will join PNHP board member Dr. Olveen Carrasquillo and others at a Sept. 23 congressional briefing on Capitol Hill hosted by PNHP and others. The “honorary hosts” of the meeting are the co-chairs of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, Reps. Raul Grijalva and Lynn Woolsey.
Additional news and updates below include:
1. PNHP news release: Blacks with muscular dystrophy die 10-12 years younger than whites
2. Census Bureau to announce latest number of uninsured this Thursday; PNHP to respond with statement, state-by-state figures
3. PNHP leader to speak at Congressional Black Caucus on Thursday
4. Update on California state single-payer bill S.B. 810
5. October 2 march in Washington, D.C., for jobs, justice (and, we say, single payer!)
6. PNHP Annual Meeting and Leadership Training, Denver, November 5-6
The briefing will target the Deficit Commission’s proposals to cut Medicare and highlight the ability of single payer, Medicare for All to provide universal coverage, reduce health disparities, and significantly reduce the deficit.
Please encourage your member of Congress and their staff to attend the briefing “An analysis of proposed changes to Medicare before the Deficit Commission and a better alternative: Improved Medicare for all” on Thursday, Sept. 23, 2:30 – 4 p.m., 1334 Longworth House Office Building. The full invitation is below. The congressional switchboard is (202) 224-3121.
Thank you for your continued support and especially your priceless efforts for reform.
Cordially,
Quentin Young, M.D.
National Coordinator
Ida Hellander, M.D.
Executive Director
P.S. Every member counts! Renew your membership online today and help support our work. Over 350 overdue PNHPers have renewed in recent weeks in response to our membership renewal campaign.
1. PNHP member and Harvard neurologist Dr. Rachel Nardin is the co-author of an editorial in this week’s issue of Neurology on the black-white mortality gap in muscular dystrophy. African Americans with muscular dystrophy die 10-12 years younger than whites, one of the largest gaps ever observed in the annals of research into health disparities.
The widening mortality gap is likely caused by inequities in the delivery system as well as coverage disparities: African Americans are 1.5 times more likely to be uninsured and about twice as likely to rely on Medicaid, which falls short in providing access to care for conditions like muscular dystrophy.
PNHPers are encouraged to forward the press release to their media contacts.
2. The Census Bureau will announce its latest estimate of the number of uninsured persons in the United States this Thursday, Sept. 16. The expectation is that the number will be higher than last year, perhaps substantially so. PNHP is planning to issue a news release providing comment on the report shortly after the announcement; the release will include state-by-state figures. PNHPers are encouraged to be in touch with their local media contacts and to offer our perspective on the new numbers.
3. Dr. Quentin Young, PNHP’s national coordinator, will be joined by Sen. Bernie Sanders, Rep. John Conyers Jr., Bennett College president Dr. Julianne Malveaux and the NAACP’s Ben Jealous at a panel titled “Health care reform: Where do we go from here?” at the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation’s annual legislative meeting this Thursday, Sept. 16, in Washington. The panel will be moderated by MSNBC’s Ed Schultz.
4. California, which has twice voted to pass single-payer legislation at the state level (subsequently vetoed by the governor), was on the eve of another historic vote for single payer when their Assembly’s leadership held back the bill (S.B. 810) on the last night of their legislative session, thereby killing it until next year.
“Let this temporary detour enliven us to work even harder to see single payer become a reality in California,” wrote the lead sponsor, state Sen. Mark Leno, to supporters. Leno pledged to reintroduce the legislation next year, when there will be a new governor and Legislature.
With the focus now turned to the November elections, single-payer activists in California are educating candidates about the benefits of single payer at both the state and national level. PNHP’s California chapter has a great new website and other ambitious plans for the future that may be a model for other chapters. Check it out here and stay tuned to www.pnhp.org/news/state-single-payer-news for ongoing news from Vermont (where Peter Shumlin, an outspoken single-payer advocate, just won the Democratic primary race for governor) and other states pursuing state-level single-payer plans.
5. Labor unions and economic justice groups are organizing a march in Washington, D.C., on Saturday, October 2, for jobs and justice (www.onenationworkingtogether.org). A single-payer contingent will be marching under a large “Improved Medicare for All” banner with activists from Single Payer New York, PNHP and others. If you’d like to join the single-payer delegation at the event, please contact PNHP Congressional Fellow Dr. Margaret Flowers at margaret@pnhp.org with “October 2 March” in the subject line.
6. Please join PNHP in Denver for our Annual Meeting on Saturday, November 6, at the Sheraton Denver Downtown Hotel. The Annual Meeting is PNHP’s most important, energizing and inspiring gathering of the year. This year’s theme is “From PPACA to Single Payer: Next Steps for Single-Payer Activists in the Wake of the Obama Health Plan.” Speakers will include Amy Goodman, PNHP co-founders Drs. David Himmelstein and Steffie Woolhandler, and more. A limited numbe
r of travel scholarships are available for medical students.
Are you ready for Leadership Training? New PNHP members – and longtime members who want to take the next step and get active – are invited to come to Denver the day before the Annual Meeting to participate in PNHP’s popular crash course in health policy and politics starting on Friday, November 5, at 1:00 p.m. We look forward to working with you! Contact Matt Petty at matt@pnhp.org or 312-782-6006 to register.
Blacks with muscular dystrophy die 10-12 years younger than whites: new study
Widening mortality gap likely caused by inequities in care, insurance coverage
EMBARGOED until
Monday, Sept. 13, 2010, at 4 p.m. Eastern time
Contact:
Nicte I. Mejia, M.D.
Rachel Nardin, M.D.
Mark Almberg, PNHP, (312) 782-6006, mark@pnhp.org
African Americans with muscular dystrophy die 10 to 12 years younger than their white counterparts, according to research published in today’s (Tuesday, Sept. 14) issue of Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.
The black-white mortality gap, which was calculated on the basis of 20 years of data, is among the largest ever observed in the annals of research into racial disparities in health care, say Dr. Nicte Mejia and Dr. Rachel Nardin, co-authors of the editorial. “Furthermore,” they write, “white patients with MD [muscular dystrophy] enjoy increasing survival, while survival of black patients with MD barely budges,” leading to an ongoing widening of that gap.
Muscular dystrophy is a group of inherited muscle diseases that lead to early death due to respiratory or cardiac failure. Various types of MD affect about 50,000 Americans.
“Inequities in the health delivery system – and the multiple ways in which race constrains access to care – seem the most likely explanation for the observed MD black-white mortality gap,” Mejia and Nardin write in their editorial. But they add that inadequate access to care due to lack of good quality health insurance may also be part of the picture.
“Nonelderly African Americans are 1.5 times more likely than whites to lack any type of insurance and about twice as likely to rely on Medicaid,” they write, noting that lack of health insurance is linked to lack of access to care.
And while Medicaid, the public health program for the poor, compares favorably with private insurance in providing access to primary care, it falls short when it comes to providing access to the standard-of-care treatments needed to manage conditions like muscular dystrophy, they say.
These shortcomings of Medicaid coverage are “particularly worrisome because more than half of the new health coverage under the 2010 National Health Reform will be Medicaid.”
In a separate comment made today, Nardin said, “Replacing the current U.S. health care financing system with a single-payer system that would ensure comprehensive insurance coverage for every American, regardless of race, would go a long way toward reducing this type of disparity.”
Mejia and Nardin’s editorial, titled “Dying young: Eliminating racial disparities in neuromuscular disease outcomes,” is based on a research paper by Aileen Kenneson, Ph.D., Ajay Vatave, M.D., and Richard Finkel, M.D., titled “Widening Gap in age at muscular dystrophy-associated death between black and whites, 1986-2005,” which is being published simultaneously in the same issue of Neurology, the world’s leading clinical neurology journal. For copies of the research study and editorial, contact the press room at the journal by calling Angela Babb at (651) 695-2789 or Rachel Seroka at (651) 695-2738 or by visiting http://www.aan.com/go/pressroom.
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Physicians for a National Health Program (www.pnhp.org) is an organization of more than 17,000 doctors who support single-payer national health insurance. PNHP had no role in funding or otherwise influencing the articles mentioned above. To speak with a physician/spokesperson in your area, visit www.pnhp.org/stateactions or call (312) 782-6006.
Leadership Conference for Guaranteed Health Care
“An analysis of proposed changes to Medicare before the Deficit Commission and a better alternative: Improved Medicare for all”
Thursday, Sept. 23, 2:30 – 4 p.m., 1334 Longworth House Office Building
Tsung-Mei Cheng, distinguished health economist and expert on comparative health systems at Princeton University. Professor Cheng writes and lectures internationally on such topics as single-payer systems, health care quality, financing, pay-for-performance and technology assessment. She also hosts Princeton’s television program, “International Forum.”
Olveen Carrasquillo, M.D., nationally recognized authority on health disparities, minority health, health services research, health policy, access to care and national health insurance. He is presently chief of the Division of General Internal Medicine in the Department of Medicine at the Miller School of the University of Miami and a board member of Physicians for a National Health Program
Michele Evermore, legislative advocate for National Nurses United. Prior to working for NNU, she was a senior legislative officer in the Office of Congressional and Intergovernmental Affairs at the Department of Labor. She also has 10 years of experience as a congressional staffer for Sen. Tom Harkin in his personal office and on the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee and for then-Ranking-Member George Miller on the House Education and Labor Committee.
The Honorable Raúl M. Grijalva (Honorary Host),co-chair, Congressional Progressive Caucus
The Honorable Lynn Woolsey (Honorary Host), co-chair, Congressional Progressive Caucus
The panelists will explain changes to Medicare that are being explored by the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform and how these changes could weaken the Medicare program. They will describe the strengths of our current Medicare, in particular as it pertains to reducing poverty and health disparities, and how an improved Medicare for All would effectively assure truly universal care, cost controls and financial solvency.
With more than 46 million uninsured Americans, 45,000 deaths a year due to lack of health insurance, and 62 percent of personal bankruptcies linked to medical debt, it is clear even more thoroughgoing health care reform is needed and must be part of any economic recovery plan.
Please attend and participate in the discussion. Light refreshments will be provided.
This briefing is intended for Members and staff. RSVP is appreciated, not required. Contact Dr. Margaret Flowers at margaret@pnhp.org, (410) 591-0892.
The Leadership Conference for Guaranteed Health Care is a coalition of doctors, nurses and other health care providers; labor unions; nonprofit agencies; reform advocates and faith-based
organizations working to achieve comprehensive, high quality, and affordable health care coverage for everybody in the United States. The coalition specifically advocates for a publicly funded and privately delivered national health care system structured around a single-payer financing mechanism. Co-sponsors of this event include Physicians for a National Health Program, National Nurses United, Healthcare-Now, Progressive Democrats of America, All Unions Committee for Single Payer, Labor Campaign for Single Payer, RESULTS, Prosperity Agenda, Code Pink, Gray Panthers and Social Security Works.