Guaranteed Healthcare

Sen. McCain ought to spend less time talking about Paris Hilton and how many magazine covers feature Sen. Obama and pay more attention to our healthcare nightmare.

With all of his focus on Paris Hilton and Britney Spears, here's some news that Sen. John McCain might have missed the past few days:

• Average patient waiting times in emergency rooms has increased to almost an hour in the past decade. The biggest jump in ER visits is not among the uninsured, but those with private insurance who are unable to get appointments for primary care.
• Across the country, nursing homes are evicting frail and ill residents mostly to bring in new patients who are more profitable to house.
• One third of uninsured adults has received a diagnosis of chronic disease like diabetes or high blood pressure, but are not getting adequate care.
• Drug companies are jacking up prices by 100 percent -- and in some cases over 1,000 percent. "Some companies seem to figure no one is watching so they can get away with it," said a researcher at the University of Minnesota which issued the report. Concurrently, the 25 biggest drug companies happened to make more than $100 billion in profits last year.

You don't have to be reading arcane internet sites to find this news, all of which appeared in the first few days of August. They appeared prominently in the pages of the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, New York Times, Miami Herald, Kansas City Star, and other major media outlets.

So why does it seem that healthcare has dropped off the radar screen in the presidential race? Perhaps they have more important things to talk about, like McCain's latest ad on how many magazine covers his opponent, Sen. Barack Obama appears on.

Or perhaps McCain would prefer to avoid talking about healthcare because his plan would solve none of the problems reported in the media this week alone.

McCain's answer to our national healthcare nightmare includes:

Taxing medical benefits which would increase the taxable income on the very working people most suffering from the recession and high gas, food, medical bills, and job loss.

Further deregulating insurance companies by allowing them to evade current minimum standards established by some states on coverage and other public protections.

Tax credits for the uninsured to buy private insurance. Too bad that the annual credits he's offering, $2,500 for individuals, $5,000 for families, is far below the current $12,000 average for insurance premiums.

Sen. Obama's health plan goes much further in some respects. For example, he'd allow Americans to buy cheaper medications from other countries and repeal the Bush administration ban on the government using its bulk purchasing power to negotiate lower prices from drug companies.

But far more is needed. A Commonwealth Fund report that also came out this week found that 82 percent of Americans believe the U.S. healthcare system needs to be completely rebuilt or fundamentally changed.

There's only one way to do that. The type of national or single payer healthcare system in place in every other industrialized country. 

Also passing virtually unnoticed a week ago was the 43rd anniversary of Medicare which, as a CNA/NNOC ad noted, "changed the lives of millions." Though it has been under a steady drumbeat of attack from the free market fundamentalists who fear the example it provides, it is still the least bureaucratic, most comprehensive healthcare program in the nation. It's long past time to pass HR 676 and restore the original Medicare and expand it to cover everyone.