LETTER: We need both parties working to fix health care

This is something we need to have a national discussion over. The need for high quality, affordable health care isn’t something we need to be divided over since it’s something we all need. Even so, some are pitching this as Obama-Care, or as the brainchild of a vast liberal conspiracy.

This president is not the first one who has attempted to find a way to provide health care to all of us, but he may be the first to have gone to such lengths to include representatives of both major parties in drafting legislation to make it so. Still, special interests are attempting the usual routine of framing the discussion in language guaranteed to alarm us, using words like socialism, big government, European-style and so forth. If special interests and opportunistic politicians wishing to ruin Obama win the day and we wind up doing nothing to address this problem, listen for the media frenzy a few years from now castigating those who “did nothing” while we had the chance.

If you’re reading this letter to the editor, there’s a good chance you have strong opinions on this issue, and I wouldn’t try to change them. I’m not an expert by any means. But I do know hard-working people who have no coverage because they cannot afford it. Even though I do have coverage, I have been denied payment from my insurance company for less-than-humane reasons. I am seeing less of my paycheck as premiums continue to increase year by year. I have had a doctor suggest pharmaceuticals I neither requested nor needed, just for his own gain. These struggles with the healthcare system are rather small and benign when compared with others’, but they point to a broken system that’s not constructed in the patient’s best interest. One doesn’t need to be an expert to see that, although I do see an awful lot of special interest money being spent to convince me, and you, that things are just fine as they are.

Today 14,000 more Americans lost their coverage. In the course of just two days the number of people who lose coverage matches the number of people living in our county. Healthcare is a national problem with moral consequences. I hope those who want to turn it into a political game will ask themselves what constituency they were elected to serve. Who will benefit if nothing is changed? Who will benefit, I wonder, if special interests manage to convince a majority of us to come out against it? Instead of falling for the usual divisive tactics from wealthy specials interests, we should demand that both parties take their eye off the next election and focus their best efforts on fixing health care.

Sincerely,

Michael Hill

Comer