Faith Leaders from Across the Commonwealth to Declare it?s Time to ?Insure PA Now?!PHILADELPHIA: On Sunday, May 18, more than 1,000 congregations representing faiths from across Pennsylvania will focus their sermons on the need to expand the access to affordable, quality healthcare. This is the second statewide clergy day focusing on healthcare. The first ?Justice for All? event, held in February featured 247 congregations. ?Providing access to affordable, quality health insurance isn?t just a ?public policy? question, it?s a moral question,? said Pastor Bill Devlin, the leader of the statewide faith coalition. ?Every faith believes that it is critical to care for our physical being as well as spiritual need. Without access to care, too many people are unable to do that ? and that is morally wrong.? During this weekend?s events, the need for healthcare reform will be highlighted during services across Pennsylvania . At each location, congregants will be asked to add their name to the growing list of Pennsylvanians who demand that elected officials enact real healthcare reform now. Elected officials will be presented with the names of their constituents who support immediate healthcare reform. …In March, the Pennsylvania House of Representatives passed ?Pennsylvania Access to Basic Care? (PABC) (SB 1137), a plan that will provide access to care for almost 250,000 uninsured adults. The plan will also provide special grants to small employers to help them cover the costs for their employees and protect Pennsylvania ?s physicians by extending state help for their insurance premiums. The bill awaits action in the state Senate.Pennsylvanians United for Affordable Healthcare is a 501(c)4 organization dedicated to improving the access to affordable, quality healthcare. To learn more or to join our coalition, visit www.insurepanow.org
Although we are not a faith organization, this is NOT a faith issue. However, I DO agree that THIS is what churches should be doing — uniting to help all people without pushing religion.We DO need healthcare reform (not just in PA), and this effort seems to be right on the money.
what,
If it’s OK for you to make money as a MD, why is it not OK for healthcare providers?
It doesn’t matter how much you exercise, you’re not going to be able to burn off a steady diet of pizza, brownies & beer.
The health of the US would rapidly increase if health care costs were based on actuarial costs. Nothing motivates people like money.
Mxracer
What do you mean by “OK”? You are asking nebulus questions.
Really! Are they calories in pizza, brownies and beer resistant to the First Law of Thermodyanamics.
Please explain what you think “actuarial costs” means.
Mxracer
So you see medical insurance as a payment consolidation service?
mxracer652,
Most people like being able to choose their health care provider, that is, they don’t like insurance companies limiting their choices. I suppose there are a few people (I guess including you) that don’t want to choose. That “feature” could be provided to you at little or no cost without needing to add the high costs of supporting the insurance companies to the cost of health care.
1st… Why not apply a scientific worldview to this question and others? Analyze the widely varying systems around the world for quality of care, cost, and percentage of people covered? Then accept the conclusions of the worldwide experiment that has been going on for years. Why have a separate method for developing our political opinions when empiricism is the most proven way to solve problems?
2nd…Why are churches getting involved in this? For the same reasons they sell childcare services, media, bingo cards, and social events. They are conglomerate businesses that get most of their power not from theology but from their product offerings. With John McCain wanting to change health insurance from something you get at work into something you buy on your own, you can expect to see denominational PPO’s near you soon. Connect the dots and follow the money.
When religion does to the insurance industry what they did to the day care industry, there will be few options for atheists.
What,
Come on now! I’m 27, have the metabolism of a speed freak & ride (bicycle) about 7,000 miles a year, race, and there is absolutely no way I can eat shit food like for more than two days & not gain weight. Why do you think the average schlub, whose idea of exercise is a walk around the block, can?
Medical insurance provides a service whether you believe it or not. I pay them to reduce my personal risk/cost by averaging it out over large numbers of people, and doing all the up front work of setting prices for services & gathering networks of MDs for me to choose from.
They function much the same way a broker does.
rna,
If you were Joe off the street and tried to negotiate your own health care policy with a handful of doctors, you would be severely limiting your choices, because there’s just not enough feasible time in one’s life to do the necessary bid proposals, evaluate them, make a decision, write a contract, negotiate terms, blah blah.
This is what an ins co does for you, for a fee.
what,
Actuarial cost = Cost of future benefits to be paid out (in terms of health care needed) based on current data (various health indicators like BP, % body fat, resting heart rate, smoke, drink, sports played, career, personal behavior, et cetera).
Workaholic chain smoking drunks who like to skydive would pay much more for the same health insurance as straight edge vegan soccer moms that jog. Just like life ins.
mxracer652,
No. That is what the insurance companies do for themselves.
MxRacer
I was a Cat 2 road racer in my early thirties (came to the sport because of a running injury) training 600 miles per week (on season) and I was easily consuming about 5000 cals/day. So what! You still have not explained to me how “shit food” violates the first law of thermodynamics.
Can what? Violate the First Law of Thermodynamics? You aren’t making any sense.
Believe? I never touch the stuff. Did somebody here argue that medical insurers don’t provide a service?
With socialized insurance you would be paying less than you presently do and getting better outcome. Most folks will choose the obvious choice eventually. But insurance costs may need to get higher to convince a few slow learners. And they will.
Mxracer
OK now that you gave me your definition of “actuarial cost” I will respond to this:
No, the “health of the US” would not increase. Exactly the opposite would happen and you would be paying a lot more for insurance. Let’s see if you can deduce why this would likely occur.
What, I respectfully agree and disagree with you. First, I think we’re all aware that food has calories; however, it’s what you get with the calories that matters as well. With an apple you get nutrients with your calories. With Cheeze-nips you get chemicals, MSG, TFAs, HFCS, blah, blah (exactly what ARE those preservatives?). These are health destroying concotions that slide past the corrupt FDA with truckloads of cash. Also, low fat is not the answer, it’s the type of fat that counts. Cholestrol causing heart attacks is a myth. I won’t go into details unless there’s a request.
Anyway-YES YES YES exercise is way important but, like mxracer said, if you’re going to stuff your face with a bigfoot pizza, you better be prepared to run 3 to 5 hours (I burn approx 600 calories with 1 hour of running). I suspect most Americans are not willing to run 3-5 hours, so they pack the calories on, get sick, go on disability and voila! Here we are.
And then they stop at Micky Deez on their way home from the MD’s office. Argh!!!
Cry4turtles
Americans are not under-nourished. They are over nourished. This is true with respect to total caloric intake and total nutrient intake. Normal Americans only very rarely have dietary deficiencies. If you are not an alcoholic and you do not have a malabsorption disease then you are extremely unlikely to have any dietary deficiencies. So “what you get with those calories” is of little consequence unless, as I have stated above, you are eating a diet high in fat or cholesterol.
If you “stuff your face” with ANY food you had better be prepared “to run 3 to 5 hours”.
and by all means don’t drink. The harm you do to your brain outweighs any mild vascular benefits alcohol consumption may impart.
C4T
Wow! I didn’t catch this one earlier.
I don’t know what you mean by “causing” but cholesterol level (particularly LDL) is a significant risk factor for vascular disease. When it comes to diet it is the most significant risk factor known with respect to vascular disease in normals.
Also as I mentioned above one should avoid transfat as well but the work done on this risk is not as mature as that of cholesterol risk.
But by all means
A little bit of anecdotal info. My mother and father, both in their mid seventies, have had recent carotid angiograms. Both should significant atherosclerosis and occlusion near the carotid bifurcation. This should be contrasted with my vegetarian (cholesterol comes from animal fat) brother who as well has had a recent carotid angiogram and has carotids that are clean as a whistle.
I recently have modified my diet because of this finding and dropped my total cholesterol from 210 to 150 with dietary and behavioral modifications that were much easier to implement than I had anticipated. Not everyone is so lucky – not everyone can lower their cholesterol to this degree through diet changes.
What, I’m no “expert”, but I’ve been studying nutrition for 25 years. Cholestrol doesn’t cause heart attacks. Cholestrol is a healing agent. It will bind to injuries in the arteries, trying to “patch them up”. The state of typical American arteries is not good, with clorine gasses in the shower, TFAs, homogenized dairy, these are things that damage arteries–not cholestrol (the blockage is secondary to arterial repair). The real culprit in heart disease is(and this will come out as soon as the statin makers lose their hold on medicial knowlege)…drumroll please….inflammation!
Of course too much of anything is not good. Too much iron, protien, vitamin E etc. is not good. But everybody has cholestrol. And chances are if your cholestrol is 240, it probably was that # when your were 16. But hey! Here’s a prescription anyway. $$$
I applaud you for your diteary changes, as anyone can do it if they put in the effort. There’s little need for statins (they are showing to be ineffective anyway), and they should be a last resort, except that they are a cash cow for pharma.
Remember, “First do no harm”.
Sorry I spelled cholesterol wrong, no tea yet.
?Providing access to affordable, quality health insurance isn?t just a ?public policy? question, it?s a moral question,? said Pastor Bill Devlin, the leader of the statewide faith coalition. ?Every faith believes that it is critical to care for our physical being as well as spiritual need. Without access to care, too many people are unable to do that ? and that is morally wrong.?
I, too, agree that getting churches involved in this sort of thing is not a good idea.
Do you think that these religious organizations would consider birth control to be an acceptable health care option for females? Abortion (if considered medically necessary to save the life of the gestating female)? What about churches trying to make people profess their faith in order to be treated as a basic requirement for getting health care?
I only ask because, right now, even without institutionalized religious meddling in health care issues, we are already seeing doctors, pharmacists, and hospitals engagin in these practices. Imagine what would happen if they were legally allowed to do so…
cry4turtles
We have been talking about diet and its role in Americans health. Cholesterol blood level is the leading dietary risk contributor to vascular disease. This is backed up by 50+ years of research starting most significantly with The Frammingham Heart Study. Inflammation (mediated by C reactive protein) is a component of the atherosclerotic process as well as ANY inflammatory process.