By BENNETT HALL
Corvallis (Ore.) Gazette-Times, May 10, 2011
CORVALLIS, Ore. — After years of fighting for single-payer health care, Dr. Paul Hochfeld is trying to change the terms of the debate. These days, he favors the label “publicly funded” instead.
Both mean the same thing, the Corvallis emergency room physician said. But opponents of a government-financed health care system have succeeded in pushing single payer to the fringe of the health care reform discussion by stoking fears of socialized medicine.
“We believe the people who most need to listen to us talk about the health care conundrum don’t come because they think we’re wacko,” Hochfeld said. “It’s easy to be marginalized.”
Hochfeld and Dr. Mike Huntington, a retired radiation oncologist, were the guest speakers at Monday’s meeting of the Corvallis City Club. Both are members of Physicians for a National Health Program and are co-founders of the Mad As Hell Doctors, a touring group that tries to keep single payer in the public consciousness by organizing town hall-style rallies around the country.
They both played an active role in promoting House Bill 3510, an Oregon single-payer proposal that “got a very cordial hearing and then died in committee,” as Huntington put it.
Despite all the setbacks, however, they’re still convinced that single payer — or publicly funded — health care is the only approach that can solve the twin problems of rising costs and diminishing access to care.
Part of the problem, they argued, is a financing system that divides people up into multiple risk pools. Even with the new federal health reforms, many of the oldest and sickest Americans will still be covered by taxpayer-funded programs such as Medicare, Medicaid, the Indian Health Service and Veterans Affairs, leaving younger and healthier populations to private insurers.
“It’s estimated that we could save 15 to 20 percent of all health care costs if we put everybody in the same risk pool and paid for it with public money,” Hochfeld said.
But they also faulted the U.S. health care delivery system for relying on a profit-driven fee-for-service model that keeps people from seeking treatment until minor ailments have ballooned into major illnesses. That results in higher overall costs, excessive reliance on high-tech diagnostic equipment, overmedication — and worse outcomes for patients.
In an effort to bring the health care crisis a little closer to home for the audience, Huntington divided national statistics by the combined population of Corvallis and Albany to estimate the local impact of soaring insurance premiums and out-of-pocket costs.
Based on those numbers, he said, it’s reasonable to assume that 12 mid-valley residents died due to a lack of health insurance in 2009, while another 224 were forced into bankruptcy.
“Twenty percent of the population accounts for 80 percent of the health care costs,” Huntington said. “Each of us is only one illness away from bankruptcy.”
In response to a question about how to get involved in the fight for single payer, Huntington urged audience members to become better informed, take a public stand — and maybe even take to the streets, like the pro-democracy protesters in the Middle East.
“Become an Egyptian,” he said. “Stand with a sign on the street corner. It may take that.”
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