Florida

Florida Information

April 2, 2008

Dr. Greg Silver on physician support for national health insurance

Click here to listen

December 13, 2007

ERs in crisis, but writer knows well of solution
ROBERT P. STEVENS | Palm Beach Post | Letters
A single-payer system would provide the opportunity of a “medical home” (Health Affairs/Commonwealth Fund 2007) for everyone, thus reducing non-emergency traffic in ERs. It also would, and equally important, pay every doctor promptly for services rendered. These two solutions, and many others, have persuaded the American College of Physicians (124,000 physicians) to endorse single-payer along with 86 members of Congress (HR 676).

November 28, 2007

Sicko Cure Road Show Puts Health Care in the Spotlight
Roman Lillie | WCTV
The Sicko Cure Road show was in Tallahassee on Wednesday, telling people about what they say are the benefits of guaranteed health care. The Road Show is traveling across the country to try and pass a bill that would provide free health care for every American. With more than forty-six million Americans without health insurance many people are hoping for a change.

November 6, 2007

With market-based health care, too many lose out
Greg Silver, M.D. | Letters to the Editor | St. Petersburg Times
If “market-based” health care is so wonderful, how did it lead us to the miserable state of health care in this country today? Our leaders seem to have forgotten the fundamental truth of market systems: There are always “winners” at the expense of “losers.” Will we, as a nation, continue to accept our fellow citizens as health care losers in order for health insurance companies to be the big winners?

November 4, 2007

Speaker’s conclusions on health care wrong
DR. H. DAVID PRENSKY | Letter to the Editor | Palm Beach Daily News
As it is now, costs are rising so outrageously that the 47 million without insurance have nightmares, worried over being hit with a serious medical condition. Too many of them find reality nightmarish when they actually are hit. In the words of Dr. Marcia Angell, for years editor in chief of the New England Journal and now a Harvard Medical School professor, “We can no longer afford not to have single-payer universal health care.

September 25, 2007

Care under Conyers’ bill vastly superior to status quo
H. DAVID PRENSKY | The Palm Beach Post | Letter to the Editor
Eliminating more than 1,000 insurance companies with their staffs of clerical workers, advertising and lobbying expenses, dividends to shareholders and large CEO compensation would save the system $400 billion. That is enough to cover every person in the United States. It doesn’t call for adopting a system based on Sweden’s but on simply expanding our own functioning Medicare. That system, initiated for those 65 and older 42 years ago, would now cover all.

September 4, 2007

Guest Opinion: U.S. needs to wake up and provide universal health care
Ray Clasen | The News Press | Fort Myers, Florida
Forget the hodgepodge of ideas that have been floated in different states on this issue; the only solution to this problem that makes sense is a single-payer universal health system administered by the federal government, a sort of Medicare for everyone. The argument that the government cannot be trusted to efficiently administer such a plan is ludicrous. The government already effectively runs Social Security and Medicare. Other large governments, for example Canada and Great Britain, administer universal health care programs, and do so quite efficiently.

August 23, 2007

We can’t afford to not have national health care
By Kenneth Brummel-Smith | Tallahassee Democrat
Michael Moore’s recent documentary, “Sicko,” has increased the heat on the discussion of health care. It’s high time Americans and their representatives took a hard look. If we did a physical on our health care system, we’d have to say it is not doing too well. And the prognosis is grim.

August 15, 2007

Need for more doctors part of solution
By Robert Gumbiner | South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Michael Moore’s film, Sicko, begins to expose the problem — the lack of available health care insurance in the U.S. — but does he go far enough? The number of people in the U.S. who lack health insurance is part of the problem. This number includes people who have no health insurance, people who are under insured and people who may be covered but don’t have access to health care because of the lack of available health care providers or providers who refuse to cooperate with government plans such as Medicare or Medicaid.

August 12, 2007

Insurance doesn’t make you feel secure
By Rose Ann DeMoro | South Florida Sun-Sentinel
News that some doctors in South Florida will now be charging patients annual “administrative fees” like credit card companies or banks is a sober reminder of how out of control our increasingly dysfunctional healthcare system has become, and in need of genuine, comprehensive reform.

February 27, 2007

Health care problem is rooted in insurance
Greg M. Silver, M.D. | Letter to the Editor | St. Petersburg Times
As a practicing family doctor in Clearwater, I see the increasing problems of our system every day. More of my patients have lost their insurance coverage and struggle to pay for even basic care. For the lucky ones who have coverage, insurers shift more cost to my patients, maintaining their profits while forcing people into difficult choices that can adversely affect their health.