By Chris Goeser, M.D., and Samuel Metz, M.D. | Statesman Journal (Salem, Ore.)
Without reform, American businesses can survive only by shifting escalating health care costs to someone else. A "defined contribution" plan allows just that — it moves increasing costs away from businesses and onto employees. These plans do nothing, of course, for those without benefits or without a job.

By Samuel Metz and Charlotte Maloney | The Register-Guard (Eugene, Ore.)
Modern mythology recounts James Carville giving candidate Bill Clinton memorable advice regarding his upcoming presidential campaign: “It’s the economy, stupid.” Those of us wrestling with health care reform might take similar advice: “It’s the financing, stupid.”

By Bill Graves | The Oregonian
A group of Oregon physicians who call themselves the Mad as Hell Doctors failed to put a single-payer option on the table in Congress' debate on health reform two years ago, but they did win a national award recently for trying.

By Samuel Metz, M.D. | The Oregonian
Medicare turns 46 this week and there is much to celebrate. Medicare assures health care for seniors who might otherwise find health care inaccessible. It saves our government money. It makes the lives of our seniors better.

By Samuel Metz, M.D. | The Oregonian
Robin Hood was legendary for stealing from the rich and giving to the poor. Now Rep. Paul Ryan proposes to do the opposite: He will rob poor seniors of their health care dollars and give tax breaks to the rich.

By BENNETT HALL | Corvallis (Ore.) Gazette-Times
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.

By Samuel Metz | The Oregonian
Am I crazy, a physician embracing legislative efforts to create a single-payer health care system in Oregon? You be the judge.

By Bill Graves | The Oregonian
A House hearing Friday on a bill to establish a single-payer universal health care plan in Oregon drew testimony from about two dozen people, most in favor of the proposal.

By BENNETT HALL | Corvallis Gazette-Times
It’s 8 o’clock in the morning, and Betty Johnson and Mike Huntington are huddled around a cordless phone set up on a folding table in Johnson’s Corvallis living room. The two veteran health care activists listen intently to the voices coming over the speaker.

The Oregon Chapter of Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP) and Mad As Hell Doctors (MAHD) will follow up on their landmark 2009 national tour and 2010 California tours with spirited rallies in Linn and Lincoln Counties during February. Their program will feature music by local musicians and the audience (singing); documentary videos by Paul Hochfeld M.D.; testimony by physicians and nurses; and “Mad As Heck Minutes” by audience members on screen.

By Rep. Michael Dembrow | BlueOregon.com
I believe that the best solution to the problems that I mentioned will be a “single payer” system. This would be a system like Medicare, but extended to all. Everyone would pay into the system in a progressive manner, and it would relieve the burden on Oregon’s small businesses. Initial projections show that we could create a system that in total would cost no more than we are currently paying as individuals, businesses, and the state—but everyone would be covered, would have access to quality care by the provider of their choice, and the rise in costs could be contained.

Single-payer health insurance is not a new concept, though it’s one that’s not always understood. It gets lumped into the term “government health care” and branded as “socialized medicine” like the national systems in, for example, Canada and Great Britain. However, as Dr. Paul Hochfeld noted, the proposals for the U.S. call for publicly funded, privately delivered care.

By Carla Amurao | Santa Barbara Independent
Last night, the Mad as Hell Doctors, a group of activist physicians and health care providers, marched across town in an effort to raise awareness about universal health care and calling “Obamacare” a bare-minimum reform. From Anapamu Street to Canon Perdido, the sound of drums and cheers filled the air while passersby honked their horns and offered high fives and other plaudits.

Nancy Crumpacker, M.D. | Letters to the editor | The Oregonian
Regence BlueCross BlueShield and other large insurers canceled their policies for children just before they would have had to accept any patient regardless of his or her medical condition. This confirms what we have long known: Since 20 percent of the population use up 90 percent of health care expenses in any given year, insurance companies make money by not insuring these costly patients.

By Bennett Hall | Corvallis (Ore.) Gazette Times, Sept. 8, 2010
The loose-knit group of Oregon physicians who barnstormed the country last fall to promote a national health plan are planning another road trip, this time to California instead of Washington, D.C. “California’s ahead of the rest of the states, but there’s more than a dozen that are formulating their own bills as we speak,” said Mike Huntington, a retired radiation oncologist and one of two Corvallis physicians involved in organizing the Mad as Hell Doctors.

PETER MAHR, MD | Letter to the Editor | The Oregonian
Oregon faces a $577 million deficit, and state leaders propose cutting state services, slashing jobs and reducing funding for schools. I would like to point out that the United States' failure to enact a single-payer national health insurance program directly affects our current state budget problems.

By Peter Mahr | The Oregonian
Obama's health care proposal does not include any of the basic principles for true reform. Our inefficient, expensive patchwork system of health insurance would be maintained. For-profit financing would continue in the private insurance market while individuals and employers would be forced to buy it. Finally, there is no guarantee of universal coverage. Millions would be left without insurance and millions more would face financial hardship in payment of their premiums, deductibles and out-of-pocket payments.

Paul Hochfeld, M.D. | Letter to the Editor | Gazette Times (Corvallis, Ore.)
Sixty percent of all our health care costs are directly or indirectly taxpayer money. Because premiums paid by employers are tax-deductible, insurance companies receive a taxpayer subsidy to cover employees. Actuarially, working people are among our healthiest. Others, who want to purchase health insurance outside the workplace must, first, demonstrate health, then pay exorbitant rates. Seniors, who are at the greatest risk for high health care costs, are covered by the taxpayer through Medicare.

DR. PETER MAHR | Letters to the editor | The Oregonian
The current federal health reform legislation's answer is to insure most Americans by mandating citizens buy private insurance. Unfortunately the private insurance industry and its related bureaucracy and administration waste $400 billion a year and leave many millions more underinsured and laden with medical bills.