Countdown to Action ~ Support Health Care Reform ~ Washington, D.C. Rally June 25^th

Join over 40 of your NPA colleagues in Washington, D.C. June 25^th for a rally and legislative visits to Secure Health Care for All. Our partner, Health Care For America Now!, is organizing this event with the goal of bringing at least 5000 supporters of health care reform to Washington. Come and help make history! Let Congress know that our patients deserve guaranteed access to high quality, affordable health care. 

Tentative Agenda:

Wednesday, June 24^th                          4 ~ 10 p.m., NPA Communications Workshop and Lobby Day Training, followed by a Candlelight Vigil

                                                2 ~ 3:45 p.m. ~ Physician & Nurse Town Hall

1 ~ 4 p.m., Lobby Visits & State Town Hall Meetings

NPA will help you set up visits with your Senators and Representatives and provide materials. HCAN is providing bus transportation from many East Coast locations. Let us know if you would like information about a bus from your area.  Help NPA make the most of your visit by letting us know that you are coming. Please click here to RSVP:

If you are unable to travel to the nation's capital next week,we urge you tosign up to Send Congress a Prescription! by hosting an Echo Event in your area the week of June 22^nd - July 1^st. 

We've created an online toolkit to provide you everything you need for a fun, easy and educational event.  You can host an event anywhere - home, a local restaurant, your clinic. All you need is a computer with an internet connection, and the contents of the toolkit. Learn more here! 

We will provide host training sessions via conference call twice in the next week. Call-in information will be sent once you sign up. The first training session will be tomorrow, Thursday, June 18^th at 9pm EST/ 6pm PST. A second session is scheduled for Sunday June 21^st at 8 pm EST/ 5pm PST. If neither time works for you, please contact us - don't let this prevent you from participating! 

Interested in participating but not hosting an event? Click here to find an event near you.

Kudos to NPA member Dr. Chris McCoy for raising the bar on the health care reform debate!  

The public plan option took front and center this week as the American Medical Association took a stand against the public plan option on June 10, as reported by The New York Times.  

On June 11, Dr. Chris McCoy wrote a response to the AMA's recent stand against a public plan option on The Huffington Post this week. By doing so, he increased awareness that the AMA represents a minority of physicians and that many physicians support a public plan option. Later that day, the AMA backpedaled and issued a press release stating that "The AMA opposes any public plan that forces physicians to participate, expands the fiscally-challenged Medicare program or pays Medicare rates, but the AMA is willing to consider other variations of a public plan that are currently under discussion in Congress." 

On June 15, A coalition of 8 organizations representing over 200,000 physicians and physicians-in-training, including NPA, AMSA, the Committee of Interns and Residents, Doctors for America and Doctors Council, issued a statement in support of achieving health care reform this year, including the creation of a robust, high-quality public health insurance option. According to the release, "All doctors need to work together to solve our health care crisis. Part of this solution should be the inclusion of a high-quality public health insurance option that competes fairly with private plans." 

Read the Joint Physician Statement here: 

As President Obama stated in Monday's speech to the American Medical Association: 

"You did not enter this profession to be bean-counters and paper-pushers. You entered this profession to be healers - and that's what our health care system should let you be." 

See the full speech here: 

Must read this week: Dr. Atul Gawande's spectacular article in The New Yorker, describing the problems inherent in the U.S. health care system.  McAllen, Texas, has the highest health care costs in the country ($15 K per person spent on Medicare vs. annual per capita income of $12 K per year), due, Dr. Gawande concludes, to the overuse of medical care.  The article explores the link between high spending on Medicare and low overall quality of care.  In addition, patients in high cost areas are less likely to receive preventive care.  The article also addresses the incentives in our fee-for-service system that lead some doctors to over prescribe certain services. Some health care systems, like those in Grand Junction, Colorado, and the Mayo Clinic have created systems of care that encourage evidence-based medical decision making and result in lower costs. This article has been called a "game-changer." Read it here:   

In response to the Huffington Post article, Dr. Chris McCoy was subsequently interviewed (several times) about his decision to quit the AMA. Listen to an interview from KPFA radio in Berkeley: 

http://www.kpfa.org/archive/id/51686, (skip ahead to the 12:00 mark) 

He was also interviewed by Democracy Now! See the following (which includes a clip of Obama speaking to the AMA about the public plan option: 

Read Dr. Peter Klatsky's post, "Why the AMA Doesn't Speak for Me": 

Have 30 minutes? Write a letter to the editor of your local newspaper by going to the following site: http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/1021/t/1926/letter/?letter_KEY=1145

Save the date!

Plan to come to Washington, DC on June 25^th to support Secure Health Care for All. RSVP HERE!

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