July 30th: Medicare’s 49th Anniversary

July 30, 2014 will mark the 49th anniversary of Medicare, our only publicly financed, universal health plan, which lifted a generation of seniors out of poverty. Each year Healthcare-NOW! coordinates Medicare’s birthday as a national day of action for single payer healthcare. Please email Ben to let us know if you would like to plan…

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BLET-Kentucky State Legislative Board Endorses HR 676

From Unions for Single Payer – Bryan Aldridge, Chairman, reports that the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers-Kentucky State Legislative Board, has endorsed HR 676, national single payer health care legislation introduced by Congressman John Conyers, Jr. The legislation is also known as “Expanded and Improved Medicare for All.” The BLET-Kentucky State Legislative Board represents approximately 900…

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Healthcare, Not Health Insurance

From Media Mobilizing Project – Everyone gets sick, but not everyone can access healthcare when they need it. The Affordable Care Act has expanded access, but millions are still left out, and most people with insurance still struggle to afford the care they need. In Pennsylvania and in states across the country, a growing movement…

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Save the Date: Healthcare-NOW!’s 10th Anniversary Strategy Conference

This year marks our 10th anniversary! Marilyn Clement founded Healthcare-NOW! in 2004 originally under the title “Campaign for a National Health Program NOW.” We are doing something extraordinary for our National Strategy Conference to mark this occasion: we will be hosting a mega single-payer conference jointly with the Labor Campaign for Single-Payer Health Care and…

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A Pro-Single Payer Doctor’s Concerns About Obamacare

By Adam Gaffney for Salon – As a single-payer advocate who is also a doctor, I was concerned after the Affordable Care Act was passed that it didn’t do enough to combat rising underinsurance. A recent study by the Commonwealth Fund, which used new data to demonstrate that in 2012 some 31.7 million Americans were…

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Listen: Health Care for All – Texas Open Journal April Episode

Health Care for All – Texas’s Open Journal radio series on healthcare reform was today, Wednesday, April 9th on KPFT 90.1FM (Houston) at 9:30am. Their guest this month was Dr. Gerald Friedman. Listen here: [audio:http://archive.kpft.org/mp3/kpft_140409_093000ojcs.mp3] Here’s a direct link to the mp3 file (right click to save). Dr. Gerald Friedman, Professor of Economics at the…

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As Vermont Goes, So Goes the Nation?

By Molly Worthen for The New York Times – When most liberals hear the words “third party,” they have nasty flashbacks to Ralph Nader’s spoiler campaign in 2000. The history buffs among them might think of the populist Greenback Party’s feckless protests against the gold standard in the 19th century or the five presidential campaigns…

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Action Alert: Don’t Eliminate Thousands of Immigrants’ Medicare Benefits

President Obama’s 2015 budget proposal would “involuntarily disenroll” some (fewer than 5,000) undocumented immigrants currently receiving some Medicare benefits–even those who have been paying into Medicare for decades–in order to realize minimal savings that will be offset by the costs to hospitals for treating the elderly uninsured. Tell President Obama that his proposal to cut…

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Maine House OKs Bill to Study Single-Payer System

By the AP – Maine’s Democratic-controlled House has given initial approval to a proposal to have the state examine whether to implement a universal health insurance coverage system. The House voted 91-52 in favor of the bill Tuesday that would direct the state to contract with a consultant who would study options for establishing a…

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May 22, National Single-Payer Lobby Day!

Thursday, May 22 will be the first national single-payer lobby day of the year, supported by Healthcare-NOW!, Physicians for a National Health Program, Public Citizen, the Labor Campaign for Single Payer, and others. Can you schedule a meeting with your Representative and Senators for May 22? You can visit your legislators’ offices in Washington, D.C.…

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