Saturday, August 14, 2004

Capital Punishment Because You Couldn’t Pay the Premium

By Rosemarie Jackowski

image None of us will ever forget the September 11 tragedy. The final death toll was 2,976 (CBSNEWS.com).

Today, in the United States, 45 million people have no health insurance. Those without access to health care are at increased risk of death. According to an Institute of Medicine report, 18,000 U.S. citizens die each year because they are without health insurance. That is like having a 9/11 tragedy every 60 days. It is even worse than that, because this is a tragedy that we are imposing on ourselves. We are the terrorists who are blocking the clinic door. This is death by legislative inaction, or death by corporate lobbying, or death because your government likes corporations more that it likes you, or Capital Punishment because you couldn’t pay the premium. Call it whatever you like. The fact is that 18,000 of us will die needlessly within the next 12 months unless we do something about it.

When we vote in November, one of the important issues to be considered is whether we should continue to impose these 18,000 deaths on U.S. citizens each year. The question is, “Which candidate will keep us safer from those deaths which are caused by lack of access to health care?” A universal, single-payer system is urgently needed. U.S. citizens are already paying for it, but the money is being siphoned off by insurance companies, HMOs, and the pharmaceutical companies.

The Bush platform does not include health care for all. The Kerry platform does not include health care for all. Only one major candidate includes a single payer, universal, health care system for all in his platform. That is Ralph Nader.

Rosemarie Jackowski is a free-lance advocacy journalist, living in Bennington, Vermont. She was arrested on March 20, 2003 in a peaceful protest against the U.S. invasion of Iraq. She is currently awaiting trial with the possibility of a prison sentence. She can be reached at dissent@sover.net.

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