The Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement has focused a national spotlight on corporate greed and the outrageous wealth of the 1 percent in the United States.

The Chicago Single-Payer Action Network (CHISPAN) is in solidarity with OWS. For decades, those of us who believe health care is a human right, not a commodity, have fought the greedy insurance and pharmaceutical industries. These corporations consistently put profits over patient’s health care needs. Have a look at these eye-popping CEO salaries:
John Hammergren, McKesson – $145M
Ronald Williams, Aetna – $57M
H. Edward Hanway, CIGNA – 28.8 M
Bill Weldon, Johnson & Johnson – $28.7M
Daniel Vasella, Novartis – $27M
Miles White, Abbott – $25.6 M
Jeffrey Kindler, Pfizer $24.7M

The insurance giants UnitedHealth, WellPoint, Aetna, CIGNA, and Humana are getting rich in the throes of a deep, economic depression for the 99 percent of us. The combined earnings of those five companies were more than $11.7 billion in 2010, which was 17 percent more than they made in 2009. Since the end of 2008, their earnings have increased 51 percent. The 1 percent of Wall Street shareholders are laughing all the way to the bank, while over 50 million people are uninsured and millions more are underinsured. These businesses make profits by charging exorbitant amounts for coverage, denying health care, and overcharging for medication. They don’t care that people suffer or die. A study by the Commonwealth Fund shows that 84,000 people in America die every year because they lack access to health care. In the richest country in the world, that is a crime!

In 2011, the Occupy movement brought protest in to the streets, on to bridges, ports, and parks. Single payer activists have been a part of these protests.

Single-payer activists are no strangers to struggle. The year 2009 saw single payer activists all across the country stage a series of sit-ins at insurance company buildings. In Chicago, members of CHISPAN sat-in at the corporate headquarters of CIGNA. Seven were arrested. Check out the video of the “CIGNA 7.”

As long as health care resources are in the control of profit hungry insurance CEOs and stockholders, the medical misery of millions of people will continue.

We want to abolish the private insurance industry once and for all. We are committed to building a movement for health care justice and working with the Occupy movement and raising the demand for a health care system where profit has no place. Join us.

EVERYBODY IN NOBODY OUT!
HEALTH CARE IS A HUMAN RIGHT!
PATIENTS OVER PROFITS!

Gender, racial, and class disparities are endemic in the health care system.

We believe the only way to end this suffering and unnecessary death is by abolishing the private insurance industry. These corporations put profits before patients and are responsible for the health care crisis.

CSPAN proudly supports John Conyers’s bill, The United States National Health Care Act (H.R. 676). This bill eliminates the insurance companies and replaces them with a single-payer system where the government pays all medical bills: no co-pays, no deductibles, and no denial of care.

H.R. 676 makes health care a human right that can never be taken away.

CSPAN believes that protest and educating people are the way to win single-payer. We have organized pickets and demonstrations in front of insurance company buildings and the Democratic National Committee offices.

Successful educational events include a panel discussion with the American Medical Students Association (AMSA) at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and a meeting on gender and racial disparities with Physicians For a National Health Program (PNHP) at Harold Washington College.

Join us today in the struggle to win health care as a human right.

EVERYBODY IN, NOBODY OUT!

Amid flyers, candy, party balloons, horns, and rousing sax music, we rallied at the Thompson Center, celebrating Medicare, America’s most popular social program. We rallied on July 27, three days before its 46th anniversary.

In this video, Tom Wilson and Quentin D. Young, our state’s Public Health Advocate, speak eloquently about the fight we still need to wage for single-payer.

Though the sun was brilliant that day, the dark cloud of the debt ceiling debate, which calls for deep cuts in Medicare, hung over our fight. But with ISPC, the Gray Panthers and the ISO in tow, we made our voices heard and connected with many on the street. People know something is still wrong with the health care system, can sense it in their bones, and in time, we will draw more people to fight for the only reform that will work.

At a time when more and more people are uninsured, underinsured and bearing the brunt of skyrocketing medical costs, the last thing we need is to get rid of Medicare. What the health care system really needs is a stronger, better-funded, expanded Medicare. That is exactly what we are fighting for. Join us!

On July 30, 1965, President Johnson signs Medicare into law as former President Harry Truman looks on.

All meetings will take place on the second Tuesday of the month at Access Living, third floor, as usual. Any other meetings needed before that will be called on an ad hoc/as-needed basis.

See all of you Tuesday, September 13!

The expansion of Medicaid is one such promise. It sounds good, but if you look at the quality of care delivered, it’s quite a bit less than meets the eye. Many states are slashing funds for Medicaid even as it becomes the only insurance option a large number of people. Seeing the issue through the experience of a woman caught in the cracks of various low-income solutions, ChiSPAN member Helen Redmond writes:

States seeking to cut costs are also privatizing Medicaid by forcing recipients into managed care HMOs. In Illinois, Democratic Gov. Pat Quinn wants to transfer half of beneficiaries into plans run by Aetna and Centene–even though managed care HMOs have a notorious track record of restricting access to care.

There is also the acute analysis over at of the Economist, which warns of a tsunami of costs associated with the PPACA, noting that the reform “add[s] millions of people to an unsupportably expensive system. Analysts estimate that America’s health spending will continue to soar under the reforms.”

Meanwhile, here is yet another dismaying report on how health care costs in Massachusetts siphon off funds that would otherwise go to luxuries like, say, education. Remember Massachusetts? Here’s a reminder: the state that was the model for out national “reform.” Onward!

PPACA, the reform passed by the Congress and Obama, was marked by the shame of the Nelson amendment and other attempts to mirror it in repeal proposals. ChiSPAN will not rest until reproductive rights are respected in law and will continue to militate against these severe limitations on health care rights.

Here is an excellent video made of the event:

Our collective group, which predominantly comprised African American youth, blockaded the entrance to Rockefeller Chapel as people were exiting a Martin Luther King birthday memorial service. In case the message from our fliers wasn’t clear, passersby could turn to the banner which stated “MLK would be with us demanding a trauma center at U of C.” Here is an excellent independent take on the controversy.

Also, ChiSPAN is endorsing a pro-choice rally on January 28. Details are still TBD!

This book, as well as this op-ed about her parents’ struggles with insurance in their small business, tells a story that happens every day to hundreds of thousands of people in America. David Summerhays from ChiSPAN spoke after the reading, talking plainly, personally and engagingly about the need for single-payer.

Continuing a fantastic year for books portraying the absurdities and dashed hopes of the (still-) broken health care system is Lionel Shriver‘s ferocious novel So Much for That, which came out in March. Written in a take-no-prisoners vein at once deadly serious and bleakly funny, So Much dares to wonder (as the insurance system does) exactly how much money a human life is worth, as she portrays two families dealing with deadly illnesses. Then check out Shriver’s interview at the Harold Washington library in which she, a long-time American resident of Britain, comes out as a single-payer supporter. (“Nothing,” she deadpans, when asked about what is wrong with the England’s National Health Service.)

An article in New York Times about a study from The Archives of Internal Medicine further illustrates this point. It’s no secret that doctors can rake in millions if they write favorably about a drug or device. But the scope of these conflicts of interest can be shocking. What’s shocking, too, is how loose the rules are at disclosing these ties. As Dr Marcia Angell notes in the article, “The journals’ lax enforcement of disclosure policies probably reflects the fact that journals, too, are dependent on industry support.”

Another marker of the skulking mediocrity of America’s health care delivery system has just hit the news. A study just published in Neurology notes that blacks with muscular dystrophy are likely die 10 to 12 years earlier than their white counterparts. The reason? It’s not too much of a surprise: “inequities in the health system.” As usual, Don McCanne of PNHP comes through with an incisive analysis of what needs to be done in light of these findings.