The Honorable______ U.S. House of Representatives Washington, D.C. 20515

Name

Address

April 20, 2007

The Honorable______
U.S. House of Representatives
Washington, D.C. 20515

Dear Representative Name

I am writing to you as a constituent, a future physician and a member of the American Medical Student Association (AMSA) who is deeply concerned about the state of our nation’s health care system. I urge you to support bold legislation to fix health care in the United States – the United States National Health Insurance Act (H.R. 676). The rising number of uninsured, skyrocketing health care costs, and unaffordable prescription drugs – these are some of the problems health care faces today. Many of these problems can be traced back to a root cause: the failure of a private, for-profit, market-based health insurance system.

The United States spends almost double on health care expenses per capita than any other nation in the world, yet we remain the world’s only industrialized democracy that does not guarantee health care for all its people. Too much of this money is spent on wasteful bureaucracy and profits for private insurance companies. H.R. 676 would replace this deeply flawed non-system with a single, publicly accountable, and publicly financed health care system. The savings from streamlined administration would be more than enough to provide all medically necessary health services for all Americans.

Recent reports show that 75 million Americans, fully one in three non-elderly adults, were uninsured for all or part of last year. Furthermore, the Institute of Medicine reports that uninsurance in individuals leads to drastic implications for families and communities. Indeed, as the title of the latest IOM report suggests, we all, the insured and the uninsured, have a shared destiny.

Even for those with insurance, the rising costs of health care and the greater burden put on individuals and employees leads to greater health insecurity. All attempts to use private, market-based competition to control costs and improve quality have failed. H.R. 676 would set a global budget for health care expenditures, so as to reward cost-saving innovation, prevention, and timely care.

Not only is it morally reprehensible that we currently ration care based on ability to pay, but this non-system is bad medicine and bad economics. As the future of medicine, I cannot accept incremental changes; it is inevitable the number of uninsured will rise again until we agree that all Americans deserve equal and quality health care. Americans deserve a health care system that will be there when they need it most. I want to practice in a system that I know is secure and whose health will not be dictated by the whim of markets and profits.

I urge you to support the United States National Health Insurance Act (H.R. 676). To sign on as a co-sponsor, please contact Joel Segal in Rep. John Conyers’ office.

Thank you.

Name