Bob LeBow (1940-2003)

In fond memory of PNHP Past President, Dr. Robert LeBow

PNHP is greatly saddened to inform our members and friends of the death of our former President, Dr. Bob LeBow. Dr.LeBow passed away in late November, 2003 at age 63, fifteen months after a freak bicycle accident left him quadriplegic. His death is an immense loss to the movement for universal healthcare. He possessed a uniquely effective combination of decades of direct experience caring for the uninsured, Harvard-educated policy brilliance, and an easygoing, humble personality. During his presidency of PNHP, in 1998 and 1999, he participated in many forums, including a debate with then-AMA President Nancy Dickey at the annual meeting of the National Rural Health Association (of which LeBow had also been president).

At the time of his accident, LeBow was planning to take early retirement from his 30-year career as a family practitioner in community health centers in Idaho to devote himself full-time to the cause of single payer national health insurance. Even after his accident, he continued his activism, giving interviews to the media and appearing at a press conference in Philadelphia in support of the Physicians Proposal for National Health Insurance.

A tireless, articulate leader, LeBow brought to his work a life-time of service to the poor in both the US and developing countries around the world. In addition to his family practice work in Idaho, he did consulting on primary health systems around the world.

He was also a passionate bicyclist and was one of the first people to bicycle solo across Tibet. His bicycle was a familiar site parked outside of PNHP annual meetings. Among his many other hobbies were woodworking, photography, stamp collecting, and spending time with his three granddaughters. LeBow spoke five languages and was a student of ancient Sumerian, while his wife, Gail, read Egyptian hieroglyphics.

LeBow was highly prized by all of us who knew him. His legacy, completed days before his accident, is his book Health Care Meltdown, a marvelous, lucid overview of our damaged health system and its remedy. We have distributed copies to thousands of physicians and the public at large, to uniform acclaim. In Bobs memory, we shall always stay committed to his vision of a better health system for all and do our best to achieve it.

Bob Lebow(1940-2003),MD,MPH, was the Medical Director of a community health center in Idaho for over 25 years. A graduate of Harvard college and the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Dr.Lebow was board certified in two specialties: Family Practice and Preventive Medicine. He had extensive experience working on the development of health systems and preventive programs in over 20 developing countries, including a two-year stint as a Peace Corps physician in Bolivia.

Dr. LeBow, devoted most of his career to addressing the problems of health care in the United States. A self-described "health care activist," in 1998 and 1999 he was president of Physicians for a National Health Program.

On a daily basis, Dr. LeBow dealt with the plight of the uninsured. He felt very strongly that America must have universal coverage, like every other industrialized country. In his book "Health Care Meltdown" he explained that only through fundamental changes in the way we finance health care will we be able to create a system that is affordable and equitable; only then will we regain our dignity as individuals and a nation.