QEJ Calls for Queers to Take a Stand on Health Care Reform
Dear QEJ Supporter --
The fight for a robust public option in our healthcare system to insure all people in the US may be one of the most important issues of this generation. The ability to access quality healthcare is something that impacts all of us. And ALL of us need to be engaged in this fight.
Believe it or not, a gay conservative group called Go Proud s pushing against the public option in health care reform, falsely stating that because of the federal Defense of Marriage Act, “any effort to expand government-run healthcare will expand government-sanctioned discrimination against gay and lesbian families.” We cannot afford to let them, or anyone else, take away the public option, that would offer some health insurance for people who would otherwise go without.
We are calling for a National Days of Action on Health Care. We are asking organizations (large and small), activists, and organizers, to join us on a national conference call to learn what you can do to join the fight for a public option in health care.
On this call hear about:
- The latest update from Congress Health Care Reform Plans.
- The vision and strategy for an LGBT-led response to health care reform,
- Action steps you can take to make a real difference.
Monday, October 5th
2pm-3:30pm EST
Conference Call # (712) 432-0600
Password: 751219#
Speakers include:
Rebecca Fox, National Coalition on LGBT Health
Kenyon Farrow, Queers for Economic Justice
Suzanne Pharr, Astraea Foundation Movement Building Consultant
Please RSVP to this call by registering. Supporting materials from presenters will be sent out in advance of the call to those who RSVP.
National Days of Action on Healthcare is being coordinated and assisted by several organizations including QEJ, The National Coalition on LGBT Health, Esperanza Peace & Justice Center, Astraea Foundation Movement Building Project, Gender JUST, Equality California’s Health & Human Services Network, National Gay & Lesbian Taskforce.
I’m sorry I missed last week’s call, but I only learned about it this evening. It bewilders me completely that gay/queer organizations and gays/queers in general do not understand that health reform is very much a gay issue and will, in fact, offer more tangible benefits to us than almost any other issue. We are generally excluded from spousal benefits, and even when they are available their worth is made negligible by the necessity to pay taxes on them. In addition, Medicaid and many other programs generally exclude many of us, especially single men, except in limited circumstances. Available data shows that single people make up the largest proportion of the uninsured population, and it is a simple inference that gay men and women make up an unusually large proportion of that population. As for any organization that opposes health reform on the extraordinary and completely erroneous belief that government action to secure wider health coverage would lead to discrimination against gay people — well, obviously their strange far-right fantasies, as is so often the case, allows them to ignore the facts of the case. Perhaps the more rational of them might be willing to look at the rest of the industrialized world, where universal health systems of various sorts cover both gays and straights quite well.