To: President Donald Trump, The California State House, The California State Senate, Governor Gavin Newsom, The United States House of Representatives, and The United States Senate
Stop health insurance profiteering!
We have a fundamental and moral problem in our country, where the health insurance industry spent $86.2 million lobbying to defeat the Affordable Care Act (saying it would have a negative impact on their business). Instead, those same companies recently reported their highest combined quarterly net incomes of the past decade, with The Standard & Poor’s 500 Managed Health-Care Index rising 36% (four times more than the S&P 500). http://preview.tinyurl.com/7lak5g9
These are the same insurance companies who are constantly denying claims as well as refusing coverage and/or rescinding coverage; they operate as a business that is accountable to their shareholders, while profiteering at the expense of the patients they are supposed to serve. As a nation, we spend more than twice the amount of other countries, yet our health outcomes are amongst the worst of any developed country. Almost 1/4 of every health care dollar spent covers the absurd and complex system required for processing insurance claims and other administrative costs. Other nations do this for a fraction of our costs. We are spending our expensive health care dollars in the WRONG places!
As a nurse with 40 years of experience, I have lived through enormous changes in health care delivery. The system has always had numerous flaws. But ours is the ONLY nation on the planet that permits health insurance companies to profit from basic care of patients. We are the ONLY nation on the planet that puts their citizens into bankruptcy because they can't pay the high cost of their medical bills. These Frontline videos are not new, but they provide a great deal of information that all Americans should consider:
Sick Around America (54 minute video)
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/sickaroundamerica/
Sick Around the World (56 minute video)
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/sickaroundtheworld/
Please sign this petition and tell our federal and state legislators that we are tired of their pandering to big insurance, and we want them to pass legislation that will alter health insurance companies by requiring them to cease for-profit business trading and follow ethical business practices that are modeled by insurance companies in other developed nations. We want simplification in claims processing, and then redistribution of those funds to help fund actual patient care. We want health insurance reform - not mandated participation in their profiteering! Please represent the citizens of this country and help improve the health of our nation!
Sincere thanks,
Linda Goodwin, RN, PhD
These are the same insurance companies who are constantly denying claims as well as refusing coverage and/or rescinding coverage; they operate as a business that is accountable to their shareholders, while profiteering at the expense of the patients they are supposed to serve. As a nation, we spend more than twice the amount of other countries, yet our health outcomes are amongst the worst of any developed country. Almost 1/4 of every health care dollar spent covers the absurd and complex system required for processing insurance claims and other administrative costs. Other nations do this for a fraction of our costs. We are spending our expensive health care dollars in the WRONG places!
As a nurse with 40 years of experience, I have lived through enormous changes in health care delivery. The system has always had numerous flaws. But ours is the ONLY nation on the planet that permits health insurance companies to profit from basic care of patients. We are the ONLY nation on the planet that puts their citizens into bankruptcy because they can't pay the high cost of their medical bills. These Frontline videos are not new, but they provide a great deal of information that all Americans should consider:
Sick Around America (54 minute video)
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/sickaroundamerica/
Sick Around the World (56 minute video)
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/sickaroundtheworld/
Please sign this petition and tell our federal and state legislators that we are tired of their pandering to big insurance, and we want them to pass legislation that will alter health insurance companies by requiring them to cease for-profit business trading and follow ethical business practices that are modeled by insurance companies in other developed nations. We want simplification in claims processing, and then redistribution of those funds to help fund actual patient care. We want health insurance reform - not mandated participation in their profiteering! Please represent the citizens of this country and help improve the health of our nation!
Sincere thanks,
Linda Goodwin, RN, PhD
Why is this important?
US health insurance companies operate as for-profit publicly traded companies, recently reporting record profits at the same time they deny coverage, rescind coverage, and deny claims. No other nation on the planet permits health insurance companies to profit from patient care (or lack thereof). It is the wrong model for our nation and needs to change!