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TechnoratiDon't Let Insurance Company Greed Block Swine Flu Response
Anyone who has had much experience with America's health care system knows that nurses are the essential players in making things work.
So as the swine flu outbreak evolves into a genuine public health emergency -- with cases being discovered in more states and the announcement by President Obama of the first death in the U.S. -- it is time to consult the nation's nurses.
And the nurses are saying that federal authorities must move more aggressively on a number of fronts. Of particular note in a call for steps to be taken to require insurance companies to suspend or waive insurance company fees -- such as co-pays and high deductibles -- that may discourage sick people from seeking care.
The California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee, which has most of its 86,000 members in the state of California, where Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has declared a state of emergency to tackle the outbreak, is making a smart call for national action to promote containment and prevention of a broader swine flu pandemic.
At the heart of that call is a reminder that the United States has badly neglected public health and allowed the nation's health-care infrastructure to degenerate at precisely the points where Americans are most vulnerable. "From SARS to avian flu to the current escalating outbreaks of swine influenza it has become increasingly clear that we are risking a major catastrophe unless we act to restore the safety net, and devote the resources that are needed to protect the public," says CNA/NNOC co-president Deborah Burger, who like other leaders of the union is a registered nurse.
But there is, as well, a need for action to assure that insurance company greed does not erect barriers to care.
The CNA/NNOC call comes at a time when the federal government is starting to take both the swine flu outbreak and the broader threat of a pandemic seriously -- after neglecting the issue when House Appropriations Committee chair David Obey, D-Wisconsin, urged forward-looking action during last winter's stimulus debate.
President Obama has taken an important step in the right direction with his call on Congress -- which stripped Obey's plan to provide $870 million for pandemic preparedness and related initiatives from the emergency stimulus legislation -- to allocate $1.5 billion for combating the virus. With public concerns and political pressures rising as the World Health Organization urges countries to prepare for a pandemic, it is unlikely that Maine Senator Susan Collins, the Republican who led the fight against allocating the preparedness money (cheered on by unthinking Democrats such as New York's Chuck Schumer), will object this time.
But Obama's call focuses on emergency funding to provide an adequate supply of vaccines and the equipment to handle a potential outbreak. That's just a piece of the puzzle.
CNA/NNOC officials argue that president's commitment, while significant and welcome, is not enough.
The union has developed an action plan that seeks a federal commitment to:
* Reinstate the $870 million for pandemics that was cut from the economic stimulus bill.
* Recruit and mobilize teams of scientists to create the appropriate effective vaccine for the virus.
* Cease and desist any reductions in public health programs at federal, state and local levels. Lift any freezes on public health funding currently in place.
* Implement a moratorium on any closures of emergency rooms, layoffs of direct health care personnel, and reductions of hospital beds.
*Allocate funding for recruitment and retention of school nurses, public health nurses.
* Expand the network of community clinics, especially in medically underserved areas.
*Add thousands of additional ventilators/respirators, which are critically needed in the event of epidemics.
* Assure the availability of protective equipment for all health care personnel.
* Require all insurance companies to suspend or waive all out-of-pocket expenses, including co-pays, deductibles, or co-insurance that discourage individuals from seeking preventive care for early signs of infection.
The nurses union's proposals should be taken seriously, especially by members of Congress who -- aside from Obey and a few others -- have failed to take public health issues seriously.
The CNA/NNOC is not a newcomer to this issue. Three years ago, it warned that the "firewalls for stopping the next great pandemic are getting thinner." In particular, the union focused on reductions in public health funding and serious gaps in the distribution of essential medical devices such as mechanical ventilators.
While research and technology are important, access to care is even more essential.
That's why the union's call for federal action to require insurance companies to suspend or waive all out-of-pocket expenses is so vital.
This will be controversial in Washington, where the insurance industry has plenty of friends -- including Collins, who accepted $258,700 in insurance industry funding for her 2008 reelection campaign, and more than a few of her Republican and Democratic colleagues.
But it is essential to make sure that skyrocketing co-pays, deductibles, and other charges that have been imposed by insurance companies do not discourage Americans who are ailing from seeking care.
As CNA/NNOC president Burger says: "Price gouging by the healthcare industry has already put tens of millions of families in healthcare jeopardy, especially in an economic crisis. At a time when untold numbers are already exposed to a dangerous virus, we need to be removing any barriers to medical care that would exacerbate the spread of contagion."
17 Comments so far
Show AllThe following article was posted at GR April 29th, but perhaps was originally written and posted elsewhere some days earlier. I don't know if what it says is wholly accurate now, or even when it was first written, but if it isn't fully accurate, then it certainly seems to be important; after having read about half of the article.
Smithfield Foods, of the USA, seems to be very guilty due to its 50% (or so) ownership in a mega-hog farm in Meixco, a farm raising around 950,000 hogs a year, slaughtering over 2,000 daily, and extremely toxic for the environment, a major bacterial producer.
The article also states that all or most msm "news" media have been quite majorly hyping the swine flu situation and ignoring evidently important facts in the process; facts besides the Smithfield Foods matter.
"Flying Pigs, Tamiflu and Factory Farms",
by F. William Engdahl, April 29 2009
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=13408
The following article seems wholly about Smithfield Foods' huge-scale hog farming, including in Mexico, and the piece apparently was originally written or posted April 25th, according to the Grist.org url for the article.
"Swine-flu outbreak could be linked to Smithfield factory farms",
by Tom Philpott, Grist.org, April 29 2009
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=13413
That article provides some resource links, including to "the U.S. disease-tracking blog Biosurveillance", Biosurveillance.typepad.com , which powerfully_true provided a link for in his or her post here, just below or above this post I'm submitting.
Like F. William Engdahl says in his piece, people need to be very careful about the reporting from msm "news" media. It's been ignoring or not looking for and then reporting based on important facts and has therefore been working, wittingly or not, on creating an atmosphere of fear that's not based on [facts], as powerfully_true and some other people who posted in this CD page have also said. So [beware].
The PANDEMIC is an pathetic fear mongering illusion wrapped up in swamp scum, toasted over a bu$h!t fire, $taged to incite fear, terror, and force our attention away from bankster fraud ( and make Rumsfeld et al. million$ of dollars ).
FACT: the 50-100 million people worldwide that died in a matter of 18 months, during 1918 Pandemic were not from the flu, but secondary strep infections ( Streptococcus pneumoniae ) that followed the flu.
FACT: Since strep is much easier to treat than the flu using modern medicine ( they didn't have anti-biotics in 1918 ), a new pandemic would likely be much less dire than it was in the early 20th century.
FACT: In recent decades, many more people have died or been seriously injured, by the anti-viral treatments, than the flu virus itself.
FACT : homeopathic hospitals in Ohio and in NYC had 0-1.5% death rates, versus 50% for allopathic hospitals. They used homeopathic gelsemium and occasionally byronia.
FACT : Masks are used in operating room theaters, by the Drs and nurses to prevent their own snot, sneezes, and germs from infecting the surgery patient. The masks are used to protect the others, from those wearing masks.
An air tight respirator is what protects a person from another's germs and viruses
It's a joke, you know -- just wait until pigs flu the coop …
But caution is still useful, so track the spread with GOOGLE MAPS :
http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&t=p&msa=0&msid=〓snip〓
Paste below, at the end of truncated URL above:
106484775090296685271.0004681a37b713f6b5950&ll=32.639375,-〓snip〓
Paste below, at the end of truncated URL above:
110.390625&spn=15.738151,25.488281&z=5
And here:
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2009/04/29/Swine-Flu.aspx
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/04/swinefluprimer/
http://www.cdc.gov/swineflu/?s_cid=tw_epr_72
http://www.upmc-biosecurity.org/website/biosecurity_briefing/#bb1
http://biosurveillance.typepad.com/biosurveillance/
Namaste
This article raises an important point - especially IF this flu mutates to come back next year as virulent as the 1918 flu. Will the money be pissed away to fatten corporate coffers? Or will it be used to see to it that the personnel, equipment and medications are available to the entire population in a way to prevent millions of deaths? Next year, this may not be a laughing matter. This year, I'm with SEAGLASS and basically laughing at how laughable it is that our WealthCare Industry and their Washington playthings could accomplish anything for the greater good.
Deny care? Our Healthcare system? LOL! They should be called the WealthCare Industry.
How do you fix the best government money can buy?
I had an aunt who was denied health care in favor of the profit motive. She had insurance and enough money to make money a non-issue, but her primary care doctor, various specialists, research labs, and insurance companies all fought over their piece of the pie while her care came piecemeal and belated when it came at all.
She is dead now. Maybe a single payer system would not have helped, but it certainly would not have hurt either, and it may have saved her life.
If we go to a full pandemic, the biggest problem will be transmission of the disease at the workplace. But the majority of USAns won't take off from work when they feel ill. Either they get no sick leave, and cannot afford to lose pay, face getting fired if they take off from work, or they have the inflated sense of self-importance called the "work ethic".
So besides a new healthcare system, we also need to end the lack of sick benefits in most US workplaces.
We need to recogize where the biggest threats lie, in the teeming urban slums and refugee camps created by the legacy of colonialism, globalization of financial markets and the idiotic war on terror.
The "Money Changers" would rather hold Prospero's masquerade ball than admit they are at as great - if not greater - risk )since they do the lion's share of international travel) than us lowly Plebeians.
Medicare must add Tamiflu to its generic formulary immediately, with a zero co-pay. States must add Tamiflu to their Medicaid formularies with zero co-pays.
Essential medications should be excluded from taxes through tax credits on state and federal levels.
These are immediate steps ... awaiting a sane national health policy.
I expect Tamiflu will be offered on EBay, at a premium, once individuals become aware of shortages,
A few hundred deaths don't make a pandemic. It's the deaths of thousands in a city in a day that makes for a pandemic. That hasn't happened, despite the fevered rhetoric from the media about global flu. I'm not saying that this couldn't develop into a pandemic, but it ain't there yet. The Flu of 1918 killed as many people as those who died fighing in the trenches over the course of four years of fighting. Shucks, even the earlier hits of that flu in 1916 and 1917 killed more people than have so far died in Mexico from our current flu.
I agree with the premise of the article that people shouldn't ever be restricted from health care because they're poor.
Sooo...we should wait until we get thousands dying each day before spending considerable resources to contain this?
We shouldn't call a stream a raging river. We should be prepared for a major pandemic, but not see one in every outbreak of illness each spring.
Like it or not, when a real pandemic hits, all we're going to be able to do about it is bury the bodies. By the time it's noticed that the epidemic has hit, it's too late to immunize people, it's too late to contain the virus, and it's going to be too late to spend money on the problem (other than grave detail).
I'm going to assume you believe this can be properly arrested or contained with much less hype and noteriety than has been devoted to this particular situation. My building principal would face dismissal if he didn't figurative go overboard to make sure every parent knew ASAP when some child in the school had strep throat, which isn't nearly as contagious as this is.
What are the parameters that you would declare a "raging river?" I can guarantee you that whatever they are, the majority of us Plebeians would castigate the public official to whom you would give that advice for not raising the alarm earlier.
[I'm going to assume you believe this can be properly arrested or contained with much less hype and noteriety than has been devoted to this particular situation]
I think you've missed my point, which is that the epidemic of swine flu isn't a pandemic. It's going to be arrested or contained when everyone has been exposed to it and has successfully (or unsuccessfully) fought it off. I've yet to see a year go by where we don't have an outbreak of flu, it happens every year and has happened every year for more than a century.
The fact that it happens every year, combined with the short term memory of the media, means that the drug companies profit from selling vaccines that are not effective against the flu that's affecting people, and the media profits from selling adverts to those drug companies. If you take the flu vaccine before the season's outbreak, you might be protected against that year's strain; as long as the people who made the vaccine guessed right about what that year's stain was going to be. If you get a flu shot after the outbreak has happened, well, you might as well inject water for all the good it'll do ya. You'll have been exposed to the real bug by then and have either fought it off, or about to be sick at that point...
I'm a bit of a fatalist, I'll not worry about a bug that's been around for years and that evolves every time it passes from human to pig to bird and back. If you wish to be warned about the next epidemic of flu, I guarentee that it's coming this fall, then again the following spring. And if either of the next few flu seasons don't turn into a major pandemic, well, eventually we'll have one. Unless some bright bugger figures out a way to stop virus' from spreading in the first place...
I heard recently that Donald Rumsfeld, as a board member/majority stockholder of Gilead Sciences, gets a piece of every Tamiflu sale through a royalties agreement with Roche.
As an already wealthy man, as well as a self-proclaimed patriot, shouldn't he be glad to donate as much vaccine as necessary to protect the citizens?
Why should the health insurance companies stop killing people in favor of profits just for a simple little global flu pandemic?