Health Care Reform-- Getting Serious And Personal In Arkansas

Don't be fooled by GOP/Big Business propaganda efforts this time-- for the sake of your family

Jane's in Sweden and I'm in Indonesia but we left Blue America in the best of hands. Digby, John, Jacqui and D-Day have been working non-stop on our campaign of cable TV ads urging Senate Finance Committee Health Care subcommittee member Blanche Lincoln to forget her avaricious campaign donors for once in her miserable political life and think about the average citizens of Arkansas and America for a change. As we pointed out last week, HHS Secretary Sebelius's report on the state of the nation's health care situation is especially weak in Arkansas-- not for Blanche Lincoln, Mark Pryor or the 4 congressmen, all of whom get free platinum health care coverage for themselves and their families paid for by the taxpayers, but for regular working families.

We're hoping our TV ads will help persuade Lincoln, who is up for re-election next year, that with 80% of Americans favoring at least a public option, her career in politics depends on her championing her constituents, rather than Health Insurance CEOs. Digby wrote 3 TV ads, produced by Brave New Films and directed by D-Day. Here's one, but you can view all 3 here:

Campaign For Health Care Choice



We need you to vote on which of the 3 ads we should use first and we need you to donate what you can to getting the ads on TV in every nook and cranny in Arkansas so that there isn't one single solitary person in the state who doesn't know that their senator is playing a crucial role in health care reform. The raw facts about health care in Arkansas speak for themselves. Blanche Lincoln should speak for her constituents, not for Insurance Industry CEOs:

ARKANSANS CAN’T AFFORD THE STATUS QUO

Roughly 1.5 million people in Arkansas get health insurance on the job, where family premiums average $11,486, about the annual earning of a full-time minimum wage job.

Since 2000 alone, average family premiums have increased by 81 percent in Arkansas.

Household budgets are strained by high costs: 27 percent of middle-income Arkansas families spend more than 10 percent of their income on health care.

High costs block access to care: 17 percent of people in Arkansas report not visiting a doctor due to high costs.

Arkansas businesses and families shoulder a hidden health tax of roughly $1500 per year on premiums as a direct result of subsidizing the costs of the uninsured.

AFFORDABLE HEALTH COVERAGE IS INCREASINGLY OUT OF REACH IN ARKANSAS

18 percent of people in Arkansas are uninsured, and 69.5 percent of them are in families with at least one full-time worker.

The percent of Arkansans with employer coverage is declining: from 57 to 53 percent between 2000 and 2007.

Much of the decline is among workers in small businesses. While small businesses make up 75 percent of Arkansas businesses, only 29 percent of them offered health coverage benefits in 2006-- down 3 percent since 2000.

Choice of health insurance is limited in Arkansas. Blue Cross Blue Shield AR alone constitutes 75 percent of the health insurance market share in Arkansas, with the top two insurance providers accounting for 81 percent.

Choice is even more limited for people with pre-existing conditions. In Arkansas, premiums can vary based on demographic factors and health status, and coverage can exclude pre-existing conditions or even be denied completely.

ARKANSANS NEED HIGHER QUALITY, GREATER VALUE, AND MORE PREVENTATIVE CARE

The overall quality of care in Arkansas is rated as “Weak.”

Preventative measures that could keep Arkansans healthier and out of the hospital are deficient, leading to problems across the age spectrum:

20 percent of children in Arkansas are obese.

26 percent of women over the age of 50 in Arkansas have not received a mammogram in the past two years.

45 percent of men over the age of 50 in Arkansas have never had a colorectal cancer screening.

70 percent of adults over the age of 65 in Arkansas have received a flu vaccine in the past year.

According to a late-breaking CNN story just now, Dr. J. James Rohack, the new president of the American Medical Association, which represents the interests of many of the nation’s doctors, said "the group is open to a government-funded health insurance option for people without coverage." A step in the right direction-- and more than Senator Lincoln has been willing to do. You can see the 3 ads here; you can vote for which one we should start with here and you can donate here-- and they're all the same heres.

John explains what we're trying to do really well at C&L and Digby did the same, with less words, at her blog.