I want to follow up on a recent letter about health care in Washington. We have half a million people that have no health care coverage and many, many more with very poor coverage. Many of these people are struggling to pay rent, buy food and pay for medical care.
The Legislature has ignored a bill (SB 5204) that would save lives and save thousands of dollars for individuals. They have instead funded, with tax dollars, an 18-month study that came back stating what we already knew: that a single-payer system (like SB 5204) is what is needed. Sadly, Sen. Annette Cleveland and the Senate Health Care Committee continued to ignore the single-payer solution. They instead used more tax dollars to fund more study by a commission whose duty is to make a recommendation to the Legislature. How many recommendations do they need before they act?
The reason that both Sen. Cleveland’s Health Care Committee and Rep. Eileen Cody’s House Health Care Committee are ignoring the needs of the people and pushing a single-payer system years down the road might have something to do with the fact that they receive tens of thousands of dollars in donations from the health care lobby.
This goes beyond politics or mere conflict of interest when thousands of lives are at stake.
