Senate Single-Payer Healthcare Bill Introduced by Senator Bernie Sanders!

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Tue Mar-31-09 02:12 PM
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Senate Single-Payer Healthcare Bill Introduced by Senator Bernie Sanders!

Sanders Puts Single-Payer On the Agenda
by John Nichols
March 30, 2009

While the one reform that could cure what ails America's health care system has attracted plenty of adherents in the House -- 72 members have signed on as backers of House Judiciary Committee chair John Conyers' single-payer proposal and others back a plan introduced by Washington Democrat Jim McDermott's legislation -- there has not been a Senate proposal to rally around.

Until now.

That's what makes Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders' proposed "American Health Security Act of 2009" such an important piece of legislation. In addition to being the first single-payer bill introduced in the Senate since the mid-1990s -- when the late Paul Wellstone, D-Minnesota, sponsored a bill similar to the plan now being advanced by Sanders -- it raises the profile of the doctors, nurses, patients and other campaigners who are trying to tell the Obama administration and its congressional allies that the legislative compromises they entertain are doomed to fail.

The Sanders bill stands in stark contrast to the proposals being considered by the Obama administration and U.S. Sen. Max Baucus, D-Montana, which would establish a new public-versus-private hybrid to try and address dysfunctions in the current public-versus-private hybrid that has left more than 45 million Americans uninsured and at least that many Americans underinsured.

"This is excellent news," says Dr. Quentin Young, national coordinator of Physicians for a National Health Program. "There is now a way for the Senate to help us exit the nightmare of a collapsing health care system. If this bill is enacted, we no longer have to put up with the outrageous costs that prevent millions of Americans from receiving medical care and medications. Nor will tens of thousands have to declare bankruptcy over medical bills. In the face of our present economic calamity, this is an urgent necessity."

Please read the complete article at:

http://www.thenation.com/blogs/state_of_change/422538/sanders_puts_single_payer_on_the_agenda?rel=hp_picks

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Single-payer health care bill introduced in US Senate
By Anjanette Riley
Arizona Capital Times
March 30, 2009

Senate members are considering a bill that would replace the country's existing employer-based health care model with a single-payer form similar to the models used in Europe.

Sen. Bernie Sanders, Democrat from Vermont and sponsor of the American Health Security Act of 2009, announced his intentions to file the bill earlier this month during the president's health care reform summit. It was filed March 25.

The system would guarantee health care coverage to every citizen. Benefits would include funding for primary care, mental health care and dental. Benefit packages would be managed on the state-level, similar to the operation of Medicaid.

The measure would also create a National Health Service Corps to combat the nation's physician shortage by training an additional 24,000 health professionals.

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the measure would save the country $400 billion annually by reducing the number of uninsured and removing the administrative costs of other government-sponsored health care programs already on the books.

http://www.azcapitoltimes.com/printable.cfm?ID=10833