A Jewish case for health reform
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Earlier this month, the Senate Finance Committee adopted a long-overdue health insurance reform bill, the America’s Healthy Future Act. It was a watershed vote that brings the United States closer to accessible, affordable, universal health care, but it was also only one step on the winding and still uncertain legislative path to the Oval Office and the president’s signature on a final reform package. For the sake of our democracy and the well-being of our country and its citizens, the American Jewish community cannot stand on the sidelines of this debate.
Why should this issue matter to us? As Jews, we are taught to care for justice — and a system that leaves millions uninsured and millions more underinsured is far from just. Our tradition teaches that an individual human life is of infinite value, and yet one American dies every 12 minutes — 45,000 each year — because of lack of health insurance and restricted access to the care they need. Maimonides, a revered Jewish scholar, listed health care first on his list of the 10 most important communal services that a moral city had to offer to its residents (Mishneh Torah, Hilchot De’ot IV: 23), and yet in the United States, more than 900,000 people are projected to endure medical bankruptcy this year because they are burdened by the cost of care.
These teachings of our tradition convey enduring values that speak across the centuries to us today. Millions of uninsured and underinsured Americans in need of basic health care are forced to go to emergency rooms instead of doctors’ offices or clinics, and health-care costs are skyrocketing at alarming rates, threatening the financial well-being of families and the long-term stability of our nation’s economy. In the face of this crisis, a remarkable assembly of doctors, hospitals, labor unions, businesses, insurance companies, drug companies, members of Congress, administration officials and people of faith have come together, working as one to bring about the fundamental and comprehensive health insurance reform our country so desperately needs.
Some ask whether we can we afford the repairs that reformers seek. The more pertinent question is whether we can afford to maintain our broken system. If we remain on the path we’ve been following, 10 years from now health-care spending is expected to reach 20 percent of GDP. Even as the wealthiest nation on earth, we cannot afford that kind of burden, and we should not place it upon our children and grandchildren. This means not only bankruptcy for millions of us; it means bankruptcy for the nation.
The different health insurance reform bills working their way through the House and Senate have brought us closer to addressing these many problems than we have been in decades. The bill adopted by the Senate Finance Committee on Oct. 13 passed after months of negotiations and ultimately with the support of Republican Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine. America’s Healthy Future Act requires most Americans to buy insurance coverage and offers a health-care “exchange” designed to spur competition and reduce costs. Unfortunately, it fails to include a “public option,” which would allow a government-run insurance plan to compete with the private market. In August, the House Energy and Commerce Committee passed America’s Affordable Health Choices Act, which requires all Americans to have insurance individually or through an employer, helps low-income individuals afford coverage, and includes a public option. These bills will now have to be combined with other proposals, including that of the Senate HELP Committee, and must ultimately be negotiated into a package to be approved by a majority of members of Congress and agreed to by the White House.
Jewish tradition teaches that providing health care is not just an obligation for the doctor, but for the community as a whole. So too, passing health insurance reform is not just an obligation for members of Congress. It is the responsibility of each of us to demand reform that is comprehensive in the services it covers, expands insurance to the millions of Americans currently lacking coverage, protects low-income and vulnerable populations, promises quality affordable care, and rests on a financially sustainable foundation.
There are thousands of minute details to be considered, and hundreds of reasons that any bill that emerges will be imperfect. But there are, at a minimum, 90 million reasons why reform is essential. Ninety million — the number of Americans who went without insurance at some point last year. In the coming weeks, Congress has the opportunity to pass strong, comprehensive health-care reform that offers expanded coverage, protects the vulnerable among us, and provides affordable high-quality care. This is the time. This is the moment when we need to come together to enact real health reform that guarantees access to quality affordable health coverage to all.
Flag CommentInnovation that radically improves the quality of care, thus reducng utilization, is the only solution. One such innovation: Lieb,J.“Defeating cancer with antidepressants.“ecancermedicalscience DOI.10.3332/eCMS.2008.88. Such innovations, however, would seem to have legions of foes, and few friends.
Obviously, someone hasn’t done the math.
Total U.S. government spending = 3 trillion.
Total U.S. medical spending = 2 trillion.
Therefore, in order for U.S. government to provide health care to everyone, it must absorb an industry almost as big as the entire U.S. government itself.
They say the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Well, good intentions will require the government to DOUBLE or possibly TRIPLE (,due to the government’s LEGENDARY inefficiency,) taxes.
Nor has someone done their homework.
Justice and compassion have no basis nor place in reform judaism. Reform judaism is about personal choice rather than groupthink. Justice, which is reliant upon a group consensus of morality, runs completely contrary to notions of personal choice. It is the antithesis of reform judaism.
mARVELOUS ARTICLE. FLAGGED BY MISTAKE. PLEASE RESTORE!!
1:24 comment reflects the totally intelligent way of looking at the plan. (please restore, flagged by mistake) 3 trillion, 2 trillion.
The article about a Jewish case for health care reform is deeply flawed for several reasons. First, it tries to link the idea that since health care reform is needed (everyone agrees on this) then we simply need to accept whatever approach is available - no matter how deeply flawed or how much it may also hurt society. Second, the article doesn’t mention the fact that numerous aspects of the various health care reform bills have been tried by various states - and have been massive failures in terms of cost control, etc. Third, the author links Moses Ben Maimon with the ethic of providing health care but Maimonidies does not get into details of how such care should be provided. As a Reform Jew, I know that Jewish ethics are to make smart, ethical decisions that are based not only in the heart but also the head. The author argues for a ‘heart-only’ approach but Jews made that horrible mistake by following Lennin and Trotsky in the 20th century, which led to worldwide horrors. Now we have another charismatic populist promising equality to all - all for just a little more governmental intervention and control. We are again jumping to fall on the bandwagon to support ‘what seems fair’ on the outside but which economists, political scientists and historians shudder at. As Jews, we need to see the total ethical picture rather than the marketing veneer: Is the plan practical, workable and desirable and what are the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats? As Jews, will we continue to be led by the nose by shallow, populist rhetoric and always follow those leading us towards totalitarianism or shall we start defining ourselves as critical ethicists that are not so easily swayed by populists (and their apologists) sprouting ‘equality’ rhetoric who lead us to ruin? Particularly those charismatic populists who are clearly anti-Israel.
I suggest that Jews fight strongly for health care reform that will actually work. Start by getting your Congresspersons and Senators to change the laws that they made so that Insurance companies can sell insurance across state lines. In the same way that President Obama got a list of laws limiting what credit card companies can do and cannot do, the same thing can happen to Insurance companies and hospitals where they have to publicly post their prices. These are two of many ideas that will foster competition and drive down prices. Modeling plans of Medicaid (which is nearly bankrupt) and which underpays doctors is not Jewish but rather fiscal and intellectual insanity. Expanding a broken, failed, Federal approach and asking the states to take on more of the fiscal burden is even dumber. We can also educate ourselves about the total spectrum of health care reform rather than the marketing put forth by the administration or insurance companies. Try asking your Doctor what he or she thinks for starters. They might actually have some good ideas.
As Jews, I encourage you to think and feel rather than simply feel. Are we going to actually learn from history or are we going to simply blindly follow whatever party talks about rights and justice the most but which in practice as in our current President is demonstrating one of the most deplorable Presidencies when it comes to human rights worldwide. Supporting Zelaya of Honduras, eliminating all financial support for Iranian human rights groups, eliminating all human rights pressure towards Russia and China; and endlessly so on. Meddling in the internal affairs of Israel (settlements) and showing far less support than previous Presidents for Israel. Tough words for African dictators but zero other pressures on them. Yet, we want to buy into the belief that he gives a crap about the human rights of Americans?
When as Jews are we going to learn to discern? It is not about left or right or Liberal or Conservative or pathological party affiliations but about what is right and just on a case-by-case basis. Stop listening to party ideologues of any party and start thinking for ourselves. Justice without wisdom is not justice but simply a sword to be yielded by the unjust. As Jews, can we or should we do any less?
As a practicing Physician and Orthodox jew,I wholeheartedly agree with Michael Thau.Too many liberal philosophical jews have hurt the conservative ,industriuos and hard working jew whose philosophy of G-d helps those who help themselves is otherwise said in vain.Doctors can no longer work for peanuts and unappreciative patients .Patients who only care that they recieve the best care at the expense of the sweat and frustration of Physicians who must deal with HMO’s ,lawyers and unappreciative patients that ALL have cell phones but can’t or won’t pay their $5 copay.
Add to the above Doctors who risk their lives with AIDS patients ,hepatitis patients and the list goes on and on.As Hillel said"If I am not for myself who will be for me ”
Jews also teach intelligence and history. Look around to other countries that have nationalized health care and enslaved providers to see the miserable failures.
Wake up and reject this crap.
I grew up in a military family. We all had free health care from the base commander to the lowest ranking airman. When we needed to see the doctor my mother or father drove us to sick bay and we were seen within minutes of arrival. We all had this and every family is better off because of it. It goes on today with my mother age 75 still able to see her base doctor or off base diabetes doctor. I know what it is like to live under this system where all in a community have health care and it is far better than what I know today as an airline pilot. The care was more efficient and equal to our community. The amazing thing was how low my fathers was. He took home about $350 per month in the early 60s yet we never thought of medical bankruptcy. If we had a major illness as some of our friends had, it was cared for.
My father died in a VA hospital in Tucson, Arizona in 1997. He died in recovery after a quadruple bypass after a heart attack. His last letter was to thank his Air Force medical staff on such a fine job for caring for him. We loved this system and if it is anything like the Obama remake of our health coverage, I am for it. And one day in the future we will look back at this as we did public education and realize we did a good thing but can always do better.
Growing up in a military family must have been an honor. However, someone along the line made a decision to “enter you” into the military life. The operative term is “made a decision”, which imparts choice. That which is being discussed involves no choice by the people who will be subjugated by it.
Again, look around to countries that, by political force, have imposed this upon their citizens. Not pretty.
As a Jewish Physician, I also agree that the current health care system would benefit from significant reform. Unfortunately, the reforms offered by the current administration and supported by this article are NOT what we need. They do not lower health care costs, increase access to care or improve the quality of health care that millions of Americans receive. The current bills in Congress are not about improving care - but rather are simply an attempt to expand government control over the economy and over your life.
Health care costs can and should be lowered by adopting tort reform (something the Democratic leaders in Congress refuse because it is not supported by the trial lawyers), by allowing insurance companies to sell across state lines to expand the risk pool, by allowing small companies to band together to buy insurance and by altering the “pre-existing” clause in insurance contracts. Unfortunately, these simple measures don’t allow anyone to ‘control’ the system, so they are not supported by the Administration!
Isn’t it time that we, as Jews concerned about doing what is right for ourselves and for our fellow human beings, start examining the facts. Mr. Pelavin has my respect. He does excellent work following his heart at the Religion Action Center, but he is dead wrong on this topic. His “facts” are in error (like 45,000 people die each year from lack of health insurance). No one gets turned away from an ER if they require care, regardless of ability to pay. If we as Jews want to be serious players in this fight, we must stop blindly supporting one political party and start evaluating all the information so we can make intelligent decisions for ourselves and our children. Only then can we truely help to “repair the world.”
why is passover important to jewish people?
here is a story - unlike most about health care - that really comes from compassion and the faith that we CAN do this, and SHOULD do this. LET’S do this and improve on it over the coming years. My grandparents were jews that just in the nick of time escaped nazi germany, my grandmother (oma) told me a story about how a black woman would share her lunch with her because she had nothing to eat. We are all in this together, it is time to care about our fellow man MORE.