Health Insurance Press Conference - Remarks by Bruce Popper
Wednesday, August 26, 2009(Rochester & Genesee Valley Area Labor Federation)
Organizing for America – Rochester, NY Chapter
Anthony L. Jordan Health Center
August 26, 2009
Remarks of Bruce Popper
Executive Vice-president
Rochester and Genesee Valley Area Labor Federation, AFL-CIO
Every day, we witness the evidence that our health care system no longer works for us. Our neighbors, our family members, and many of us face unreasonable premium increases, higher out-of-pocket costs, and loss of coverage. Rising health care expenses threaten practically every working family in our community. The trend to lower rated plans that cover less makes matters even worse.
Without real health reform enacted by Congress, our standard of living will continue to be at risk. That’s why we must unite to make sure that our elected officials act decisively to fix our broken health care system.
I am responsible for negotiating contracts that provide health benefits for 7,000 health care workers and their families in Western New York, including many employees right here at the Jordan Health Center. The lowest cost estimates that we now have for community rated health insurance plans project a 15% premium increase for both 2010 and 2011. That means a rise of over 30% in cost within the next 16 months.
This is a burden that our members and their employers simply can not bear.
The choice before us is very clear: either we abandon the notion that every American is entitled to the security of quality, affordable health care, or we take decisive action now.
Doing nothing will result in continuing misery for an increasing number of working families - with lack of preventive care, deferred and delayed treatment, and with bankruptcies and foreclosures caused by medical debt.
I was involved the last time we tried to reform health care - a decade and one-half ago. We failed to achieve meaningful change. That experience led many politicians to avoid the issues of the public’s health like the proverbial plague.
President Obama has shown the courage to bring health care to the fore once again, risking his standing by taking on the special interests and opponents of real change. He walks in the foot steps of another champion of working families - Senator Ted Kennedy - who we lost last night.
In Senator Kennedy’s words: “For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die.”
We are on the eve of making Senator Kennedy’s dream of quality, affordable health care a reality for every American if only we keep our eyes on the prize, work hard, and fight like hell for what is right.
Now is the time.