Forum for Healthcare Justice

Chuck Pennacchio

As the nine Justices of the Supreme Court decide the fate of the Affordable Care Act, we are pursuing another Justice – healthcare justice.

You don’t have to look far to find someone paying hundreds of dollars a month in health insurance premiums for coverage that carries thousands of dollars in deductibles annually. You may also know of those who remain uninsured (often with fatal results) because those premiums and deductibles are beyond their ability to pay. Such is the nature of the dysfunctional medical-financial-industrial complex in the U.S.  It is a racket. The current health insurance model for those under age 65 is a money pit that in many cases leads to medical bankruptcy. The health insurance industry is the pig in the middle, hogging vast amounts of our health care dollars to fatten its own profits and market its pricey products.

Donna Smith (featured in Michael Moore’s documentary, SiCKO) wrote recently in Common Dreams, “My cancer won’t wait and doesn’t care about what nine robed judges in Washington, DC, say about healthcare…cancer, illness, and injury march on…It doesn’t matter which way the Supremes take this. So long as the private insurance giants are in my life and in my body, those insurance companies do what they do to keep their costs down and make money. Making me healthy and whole again is not their concern or their primary motivation.” Donna has been a strong voice for single-payer healthcare – improved, expanded Medicare for all for life.

We have many times sung the praises of the only true way to provide comprehensive, affordable coverage to everyone – a single-payer system. The term single-payer is not exactly the most inspired moniker. Think improved Medicare for all.

In Pennsylvania, the organization promoting this common sense approach statewide is HealthCare4AllPA. Thanks to CS2 editor Chuck Brown and the good people of St. Barnabas Episcopal Church in Kutztown, you will have an opportunity to learn exactly what single-payer is, how you can join this effort, and why you’d want to.

HealthCare4AllPA president Dave Steil and executive director Chuck Pennacchio will headline a panel to inform and excite you about this movement. Plan to attend the presentation on Tuesday, July 17, 6:30 p.m., at St. Barnabas Episcopal Church, 234 E. Main Street, Kutztown. Find out what this health care reform can mean for you. (Due to pressing medical issues, the forum has been postponed. We will let you know when it is rescheduled.)

As Donna Smith explains, “Because until our demands are louder than the billows of hot air, the counting of profits, and the shouting of the pundits and surrounding all the political maneuvering, cancer doesn’t care. Do you? Let’s do the right thing so that if and when illness strikes, we aren’t waiting for any judge – in black robes or in business suits working for the insurance companies – to say what our healthcare will be.”

Following the panel discussion and Q&A session at St. Barnabas, you are cordially invited to enjoy food and beverages provided by our hosts at St. Barnabas. We guarantee you’ll be glad you attended. This is not just our fight – this is your fight, too.