Column by Kevin Eigelbach
Cincinnati Post
January 01, 2007
Dr. Donald L. Rucknagel has a very unscientific theory about why people – other than those with a vested interest in the present system – oppose government-funded health insurance:
In addition to the 12 already discovered, there are two cranial nerves in the human brain. Mention the words government or taxes, and the two nerves shut the brain down.
It’s the only explanation. The arguments for single-payer, universal health care are just too compelling.
In his 78th year, the former director of the Sickle Cell Center at Children’s Hospital has found the most important work of his life: lobbying for the Health Care For All Ohioans Act.
The act would set up a system of free medical care for all residents, with a patient’s choice of doctors, paid for by a combination of taxes and savings:
A 3.5 percent payroll tax paid by employers.
A 3 percent gross receipts tax on businesses.
A 6.2 percent addition to the state income tax for those making more than $90,000 a year, plus a 5 percent surtax on gross income for those making more than $200,000 a year.
$11.6 billion in cost savings from having all claims paid by a single payer, plus the savings from making preventative care more accessible.
From the office inside his home in downtown Cincinnati, Rucknagel’s helping the Single-Payer Action Network of Ohio collect 143,000 signatures supporting the Act, plus raising money to lobby for its passage.
If the General Assembly doesn’t pass the act, the group plans to collect 143,000 more signatures and put the issue on the November ballot. It’s a moral issue, Rucknagel says, quoting Martin Luther King Jr.: “Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most shocking and inhumane.”
He can tell you story after story about how people without health insurance use the hospital emergency room as their primary care physician. This drives up costs because emergency room care costs more, and because the patients have often put off care until their condition is harder to treat.
Rising costs drive companies to stop paying for their employees’ health insurance. This creates more uninsured people, further driving up costs, and so on.
“What good is it to have all this medical care if people can’t afford it?” Rucknagel asked.
Selling the Act to the 60 percent of Ohio employers who still provide health insurance shouldn’t be hard, he said, because they would pay less than they now do. The harder sell will be to the wealthy and to the health-insurance companies, which see this as a step toward national health insurance.
That’s exactly what it is, Rucknagel says.
All progressive movements begin in the states. “The states are the laboratories of democracy,” he said. California and Ohio have the best shot at creating a system that other states can emulate, he said.
Imagine living in an Ohio with this health-care system: You wouldn’t have to check if you’re covered for a procedure before you have it. You wouldn’t have to worry that your doctor didn’t prescribe you something your insurance wouldn’t pay for.
You wouldn’t fear changing jobs because you’d lose your health insurance. You wouldn’t have health care co-pays and deductibles that threatened to bankrupt you.
Sound good? You can find out more at www.spanohio.org. Or call Rucknagel at (513) 931-3459.
Staff reporter Kevin Eigelbach writes on religion for The Post. Write him at keigelbach@cincypost.com.