Midcoast Health Care Reform

Resolve, Memorializing the United States Congress To Enact and the President of the United States To Sign Legislation that Establishes a National, Universal, Single-Payer, Not-For-Profit Health Care Plan

Preamble. WE, your Memorialists, the People of the State of Maine, most respectfully present and petition the President of the United States and the United States Congress as follows:

WHEREAS, morally and constitutionally everyone deserves access to affordable quality health care; and

WHEREAS, administrative costs and profits inherent in our current private insurance-based system consume 31% of health care spending, nearly twice that spent by other national health care systems; and

WHEREAS, the cost for the United States National Health Insurance Act, H.R. 676, for a vast majority of employers and employees, would only be 5% of income; and

WHEREAS, today medical bills contribute to one-half of all personal bankruptcies, the majority of which happen to people who have insurance when illness occurs; and

WHEREAS, proposed mandatory private for-profit health insurance plans will be affordable only for those people who choose high deductibles and minimal coverage, discouraging preventive care and saddlling many families with huge medical bills; and

WHEREAS, over the last 35 years managed care, health maintenance organizations, and private for-profit health reforms have failed to contain health care costs, which now threaten the international competitiveness of United States manufacturers; and

WHEREAS, Harvard researchers have estimated that more than $300,000,000,000 per year could be recovered by replacing private insurance companies with a public single-payer plan, enough to cover the uninsured and to improve coverage for all those who now have only partial coverage; and

WHEREAS, the United States National Health Insurance Act would ensure universal coverage for all medically necessary services, contain costs by slashing bureaucracy, protect the doctor-patient relationship, ensure that patients have a completely free choice of doctors and hospitals and allow independent private physicians to make decisions about needed care rather than the profit-oriented corporations; now, therefore, be it

Sec. 1. Health insurance legislation. Resolved:: That We, your Memorialists, respectfully urge and request that 111^th United States Congress enact and the President of the United States sign legislation that is substantially similar to the United States National Health Insurance Act, H.R. 676, which was introduced in the 110^th United States Congress; and be it further

Sec. 2. Secretary of State to transmit copies. Resolved:: That the Secretary of State shall transmit suitable copies of this resolve, duly authenticated by the Secretary of State, to the President of the United States and the United States Congress and to each member of the Maine Congressional Delegation.

This initiated bill urges and requests the 111^th United States Congress to enact and the President of the United States to sign legislation that is substantially similar to the United States National Health Insurance Act, H.R. 676 from the 110^th United States Congress, which would establish a national, universal, single-payer, not-for-profit health care plan.