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Contact Information
PNHP-New York Metro
Address: 220 Fifth Avenue, 2nd Floor, New York, NY 10001
Phone: (212) 485-6235
Fax: (212) 389-1409
Website: www.pnhpnymetro.org
Email: info@pnhpnymetro.org
Capital District (NY) Chapter
Email: pnhpcapitaldistrict@gmail.com
Finger Lakes Chapter
Website: www.pnhpfingerlakes.org
E-mail: PNHPRochester@aol.com
PNHP of Central New York
Contact: Jen Muniak
E-Mail: jennifer.muniak@gmail.com
Single PayerNew York
Website: http://www.singlepayernewyork.org/
E-Mail: singlepayernewyork@gmail.com
Media Contacts
Oliver Fein, M.D.
(212) 746-4030
ofein@med.cornell.edu
Dr. Fein is president of PNHP. A general internist who is active in clinical practice, he is also professor of clinical medicine and clinical public health at Weill Medical College of Cornell University, where he serves as associate dean responsible for the Office of Affiliations and the Office of Global Health Education. Dr. Fein has advocated for an expanded role for primary care, for academic health centers in urban health care delivery systems, and for national health system reform. He was Robert Wood Johnson Health Policy Fellow during 1993-1994, when he worked in the office of Senate Democratic Majority Leader George Mitchell. He spent 17 years at the Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center developing community-based ambulatory care practices and the Division of General Medicine. He is chair of the NY Chapter of PNHP and immediate past vice president of the American Public Health Association.
Andrew D. Coates, M.D.
(518) 475-4257
esquincle@verizon.net
Andrew D. Coates, MD, secretary of the Capital District chapter of Physicians for a National Health Program, a non-profit research and education organization of 17,000 physicians, medical students and health professionals who support single-payer national health insurance. Dr. Coates is an Assistant Professor of Medicine and Psychiatry at Albany Medical College and also recording secretary in his local division of the Public Employees Federation, AFL-CIO.
Mary O’Brien, M.D.
(212) 854-9842
meo1@columbia.edu
Dr. O’Brien graduated from Harvard Medical School, trained at Columbia Presbyterian in internal medicine, and is double boarded in Emergency Medicine and Internal Medicine. Dr. O’Brien has practiced medicine in NYC for the past 30 years and is on the faculty at Columbia College of Physicians and Surgeons. Dr. O’Brien is on the board of NY Metro chapter of PNHP and chairs the Media/Communications Committee. She has co-edited “10 Excellent Reasons for National Health Care”, a small pocket book which will be out in late July early August, 2008
Laura S. Boylan, M.D.
(212) 263-3029
laura.boylan@med.nyu.edu
Dr. Laura S. Boylan is member of Physicians for a National Health Program, a non-profit research and education organization of 17,000 physicians, medical students and health professionals who support single-payer national health insurance. She is a Clinical Associate Professor of Neurology at New York University School of Medicine and practices at the Department of Veteran’s Affairs and in Pennsylvania. She completed her medical training at Columbia University College of Physicians & Surgeons.
Elizabeth Rosenthal, M.D.
(914) 698-2190
betsyr@optonline.net
Dr. Rosenthal is a semi-retired dermatologist in private practice in Mamaroneck, NY (Westchester County). She comes from a family of doctors and went to NYU Medical, graduated in 1967 and did my postgraduate training at several different places including Syracuse, NY, Detroit, and Boston. She has been in practice in Mamaroneck for 31 years and has also been on the volunteer faculty of Albert Einstein College of Medicine for 33 years where she supervised residents and students in the Pediatric Dermatology clinic.
Ayana Jordan
(646) 418-5399
AYANA JORDAN is a fifth year MD/PhD student at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University. Ayana had the pleasure to co-chair the past two student forums sponsored by PNHP entitled Medical Student Activism, Past, Present, and Future and MEDICAL STUDENT ACTIVISM: Reforming Healthcare Through Student Action with participation from the American Student Medical Association, Student National Medical Association, Einstein Community Health Outreach (ECHO) free clinic and New York University’s free health clinic. Currently, Ayana serves as the president for the Einstein chapter of PNHP. She looks forward to continuing the work of building partnerships between communities of color, medical students and PNHP.
State Organizations Endorsing HR676
- Ithaca, NY
- Cortland County egislature, NY
- Ulster County, NY
Local Unions Endorsing HR676
- New York Professional Nurses Union, New York, NY
- Troy Area Labor Council, AFL-CIO, Troy, NY
- United University Professions, Local 2190 AFT, New York State United Teachers, Albany, NY
- Local 21 NABET/CWA, National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians (NABET)/Communications Workers of America (CWA), Albany, NY
- 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East, MD, DC, NY State, MANew York, NY
- PEF/encon Albany Steward Council (Public Employees Federation/encon) representing Professional, Scientific and Technical employees at the New York State Dept. of Environmental Conservation, Albany, NY.
- Local 1000, American Federation of Musicians (AFM), New York, NY
- Local 524, International Alliance of Theatrical and Stage Employees (IATSE), Glens Falls-Saratoga, NY
- Albany Central Federation of Labor, Albany, NY
- Solidarity Committee of the Capital District, Albany NY
- Organization of Staff Analysts (OSA/RT), New York, NY
- District Council 37, American Federation of State, County & Municipal Employees (AFSCME)New York City, NY
- Theatrical Protective Union (TPU) Local One, International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employes, Moving Picture Technicians, Artists and Allied Crafts (IATSE), New York City, Westchester and Putnam Counties
- Hudson Valley Area Labor Federation, Newburgh, NY
- Lodge 1145, IAM, Selkirk and DeWitt, NY
- Local 2334, AFT, Professional Staff Congress-CUNY, New York City, NY
- Local 1549, AFSCME, representing 19,000 clerical and administrative workers for the City ofNew York
- Local 1180, Communications Workers of America (CWA), New York, NY
- Retirees Association of District Council 37, AFSCME, New York, NY
- CIRSU, New York, NY
- Greater Glens Falls Central Labor Council, Glens Falls, NYWarren, Washington, Hamilton, and Northern Saratoga Counties
- Central New York Labor Council, Utica, NY
- Rochester and Vicinity Labor Council, Rochester, NY
- Rochester and Genesee Valley Area Labor Federation
- Transit Workers Union Local 264 (TWU)
- New York State Nurses Association
- Northeast Central Labor Council AFL-CIO, Plattsburgh, NY
- Capital District (NY) Area Labor Federation
- AFM Local 802, Association of Musicians of Greater New York
- International Union of Painters & Allied Trades District Council #4
New York State News
By GLENN WILBURN | MyFoxNY.com
Doctors and nurses from Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP) provided free health care to the Occupy Wall Street protesters at Zuccotti Park on Sunday.
By Erica Ferrari | NY1 News
Nurses and doctors joined the Occupy Wall Street protesters Sunday to rally for health care reform, and tourists continued to funnel in and out of Zuccotti Park to witness the demonstrations for themselves.
By JESSICA FIRGER and SUMATHI REDDY | The Wall Street Journal
As temperatures dip and the Occupy Wall Street protesters head into their sixth week of camping at Zuccotti Park, health professionals say they are treating activists for ailments ranging from hypothermia to skin infections, the effects of living outside in crowded conditions with little more than sleeping bags and tarps.
News release
NEW YORK – The New York Metro chapter of Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP), an 18,000-member national organization, denounces the federal debt ceiling deal signed into law by President Obama on Tuesday.
By Douglas Turner | The Buffalo News
In New York, Assemblyman Richard Gottfried, D-Manhattan, has introduced legislation creating a single-payer plan for all residents of the state. Gottfried is Health Committee chairman. His bill has more than 60 Assembly and Senate co-sponsors. Among them are Democratic Assembly Members Sam Hoyt, Crystal Peoples-Stokes and Mark F. Schroeder, of Buffalo.
By Trevor T. Alford | The Legislative Gazette (Albany, N.Y.)
Looking to follow in the footsteps of Vermont, which passed legislation May 26 leading toward a single-payer health care system in that state, two lawmakers are pushing for the adoption of a public health option in New York.
By Cara Matthews | The Journal News (White Plains, N.Y.)
Democratic lawmakers in both houses introduced a universal health care bill today, under which publicly sponsored coverage would replace coverage by insurance companies. Instead of premiums, there would be broad-based public financing of health care based on people’s ability to pay. It would be funded through a graduated income tax, and the system wouldn’t have deductibles or co-payments. Delivery of care would remain primarily private.
Single Payer New York Single payer advocates will join with leaders of the Legislative Health Committees on Tuesday June 7 at noon to announce the introduction of legislation to create a Medicare for All style universal health care system in NY.
By Casey Seiler | Albany Times Unions
Dr. Garrett Adams, president of Physicians for a National Health Program, is swinging through the Capital Region meeting with fellow advocates for a single-payer health care system, and doing interviews with Susan Arbetter of “The Capitol Pressroom”
By Madeline Zevon | The Journal News (White Plains, N.Y.)
Under the PPACA bill, 23 million Americans will still be uninsured in 2019. Surging health-care costs will not be contained. As long as we have private insurers we will never be able to achieve truly universal or affordable care. Compared with other developed nations, the United States pays twice as much for health care and yet ranks 49th among male and female life expectancy. By replacing the inefficient patchwork of private insurers with a streamlined single-payer, our nation can save about $400 billion annually, enough to cover everyone, with no co-pays or deductibles. The House single-payer bill, HR 676, will be introduced again this month. In the 2009-10 Congress, there were 12 co-sponsors from New York, and Nita Lowey, D-Harrison, recently said that when the same bill is reintroduced, she will sign on.
By Andrew D. Coates | The Daily Gazette (Schenectady, N.Y.)
The Schenectady Free Health Clinic provides high-quality care to some 2,600 patients, about 18 percent of Schenectady County’s uninsured, free of charge. The need for the clinic is increasing.
By Joseph Birnbaum | Times Herald-Record (Middletown, N.Y.)
Despite the valuable controls being put in place to prevent the insurance companies from denying and limiting needed care, the fact remains that Big Insurance and Big Pharma (the medical/industrial complex) are still in firm control of our health-care system and will still be able to spend 25-35 percent (or more) of your health-care dollars on management, marketing and huge administrative salaries.
By Richard Propp | Albany (N.Y.) Times Union
Friday marks the 45th birthday of Medicare, signed into law by President Lyndon Johnson, in the presence of former President Harry Truman, an early proponent. Medicare has provided care to people 65 and older since 1966, and more recently to those who are disabled or who have end-stage kidney disease.
By RICHARD PROPP | Albany Times-Union
After seven years of academic medicine, 20 years of private practice and 10 years at the state Health Department in patient safety, I became convinced by my studies that uninsurance and underinsurance were our biggest public health problems, responsible for extensive unnecessary illness, deaths, bankruptcies and economic noncompetitiveness. I retired from state government in 2005 to help form an interfaith alliance to work on this issue.
By George Jolly | The Saratogian (Saratoga Springs, N.Y.)
Health care reform has derailed and is sitting beside the tracks. The proposals that came out of Congress are patchworks of policies which try to alleviate some of the most egregious failures of our present healthcare “non-system,” such as limiting the power of insurance companies to refuse to cover those with pre-existing conditions.
By Russell Mokhiber | Single Payer Action
Single payer activists David Himmelstein and Steffie Woolhandler are moving to New York City. In the fall of 2010, they will become full professors at the City University of New York (CUNY) School of Public Health at Hunter College.
By CATHLEEN F. CROWLEY | Albany (N.Y.) Times Union
The keynote speaker at an upcoming forum on health reform has two arrests to prove her devotion to her cause. Dr. Carol Paris, a Maryland psychiatrist, was arrested at a U.S. Senate hearing in June after she stood up and asked senators to consider a single-payer system. Paris was arrested again a week ago while trying to deliver a letter to President Barrack Obama.
By Paul Post | The Saratogian (Saratoga Springs, N.Y.)
I think [the proposed health care legislation] should be defeated in its current form. I belong to a group called Single Payer New York. We promote the concept, “Medicare for all.” Under proposed legislation, only half the people without insurance or the underinsured would actually be covered. The rest wouldn’t. We want access. Health care should be for everyone. Also, health care quality should be improved, based on evidence-based medicine, and it should be “portable.” People shouldn’t have to change insurance providers when they change employers. Sometimes there are gaps and waiting periods. God forbid you have a serious illness during one of those times.
By Andrew Coates | Rochester City Newspaper
The crux of the legislation in Congress is compulsory private insurance. Under the "individual mandate," a long-held wish of the insurance companies, the government will coerce people to become and remain their paying customers.
By Athena Godet-Calogeras, Peter Mott and Andrew Coates | The Buffalo News
You might think that all of us who have worked so long and so hard for comprehensive and affordable health care would be jumping with joy at the recent passage of a House bill and the opening of the Senate debate on health insurance reform. Not so.
By MIMI KOREN | Sound and Town Report
A Mamaroneck physician believes that a single-payer plan would be the only effective way to reform the nation’s health system. Early this week she denounced the reform bills passed by the House of Representatives and now up for debate in the Senate. “I don’t think [they] will fix things,” said Dr. Elizabeth Rosenthal. “The best thing to do [would be] scrap them both and do single-payer. But it doesn’t look like that’s going to happen.”
From Dr. Laura Boylan
I was arrested this morning in an act of peaceful civil disobedience along with a diverse group of seven others, including a medical student and a nurse, similarly passionate about Medicare for All. Ours was one of 17 actions organized by Mobilization for Health Care for All across the country to honor International Human Rights Day. We blocked the doors to Sen. Charles Schumer’s office building.
By Ashley Smith
The battle for health care reform is heating up in Congress. The House has already passed one bill, and the Senate is debating another version. But as Dr. Andy Coates explains, both bills will fail in solving the health care crisis--and, in fact, place a greater financial burden than ever on working people.
By Kathlyn Stone | TC Daily Planet
The American Medical Association has come out against President Obama’s “public option†for health care reform, but the AMA doesn’t represent all physicians. Some physicians’ groups support the public option but others think it doesn’t go far enough to fix changes in a badly broken system. Dr. Oliver Fein, president of the progressive Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP), found a warm welcome in the Twin Cities last week. Fein was here to present PNHP’s vision for a national single payer health program. PNHP has 16,000 members, including 300 in Minnesota.