By BRIAN NEARING
Times Union (Albany, N.Y.)
Sunday, October 11, 2009
ALBANY — Since being diagnosed with chronic kidney disease six years ago, Stephanie Agurkis has not been able to get health insurance.
“I’m paying for treatments myself,” said the 29-year-old nursing student and part-time farm stand worker from Ithaca. “And every year that goes by, I am more and more in debt.”
Agurkis was among more 100 people who met Saturday at Albany Medical College to talk about the political campaign to bring a government-run national health care system to the United States.
In use in Canada and several other industrial democracies, such systems are called “single-payer” and one payer, the government, sets doctor and hospital fees, and pays all the bills, with patients charged nothing. Even though Democrats in Congress are currently crafting a health care reform plan to require people to buy private health insurance and keep insurance companies from excluding the unhealthy, backers of a single-payer plan think the idea isn’t dead yet.
The U.S. already has a single-payer system in Medicare, a health insurance program for the elderly. “We see this as Medicare for all,” said Andy Coates, a doctor at Albany Medical College and member of the advocacy group and conference sponsor Single Payer New York. “Necessary medical care is the responsibility of a modern democracy. The best way to share the cost is to have everybody in, nobody out.”
The fate of a single-payer plan in the Congress could be decided later this month, when a vote could come in the House on a proposal to embrace it, said U.S. Rep. Paul Tonko, D-Amsterdam, who sits on the Education and Labor Committee, one of three House committees that are trying to create a bill to pass.
At Saturday’s event, he said the chances of single-payer don’t appear bright.
“This summer, there were a lot of delaying tactics and denial syndrome during the debate on health care,” said Tonko, whose August public meeting on the issue drew an angry crowd that devolved into a shoutfest.
Asked about the upcoming vote on single-payer, Tonko said, “A lot of people are absolutely deaf to the issue, even within the majority (Democrats).”
Afterward, Coates said Tonko was being “practical and realistic,” and that health care reform is being blocked by the powerful health insurance lobby. “The industry is a very formidable opponent, that has millions and millions of dollars to spend on this.”
Single Payer New York Co-chairman Mark Dunlea said voters should ask their Congressional representatives to support the measure, which is sponsored by Rep. Anthony Weiner, D-Queens .
Dunlea said a single-payer plan would help pay for itself by cutting $400 billion in insurance company overhead and profits out of health-care costs.
To pay the for program, the measure proposes a 4.75 percent payroll tax, which would include the current 1.45 percent Medicare payroll tax. Further revenue would be raised by a 5 percent health tax on the top 5 percent of income earners, and a 10 percent tax on the top 1 percent of income earners.
Brian Nearing can be reached at 454-5094 or at bnearing@timesunion.com.
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