OpenForum – a blog by the Health and Human Rights community

Now that the President has officially designated the ongoing health care reform efforts as “health insurance reform,” we can stop the charade that this debate was ever about “care.” Or about health, for that matter. Oddly enough, the obsession with “coverage” – a potential mechanism to facilitate access to care – has not led to a serious consideration of the private insurance industry’s raison d’être, at least not beyond the community of single payer advocates whose voices are drowned in the constant drumbeat about a supposedly American – read: “market” – solution.

How are the current proposals for health insurance reform treating an industry that siphons off roughly $10 billion in annual profits? We now have two health reform bills reported out of congressional committees (”America’s Affordable Health Choices Act” in the House and the “Affordable Health Choices Act” in the Senate – using terminology pushed by Democratic pollsters, no doubt). Neither of them meets key human rights standards, and both cast private insurance corporations in the role of gatekeepers that control people’s access to care. At the same time, opposition is mounting against all and any reform measures.

Yet there continues to be great hope among many long-time health policy advocates that will we see meaningful health reform later this year. Advocates count on this reform to solve or at least alleviate the current health care crisis, which results in an estimated 22,000 preventable deaths due to lack of insurance each year, as well as skyrocketing costs that bankrupt families and public budgets alike. Pundits optimistically point to the many new measures the reform bills introduce: reining in the “free” insurance market through tougher regulation, including through a so-called Exchange mechanism; setting up a public insurance plan; expanding Medicaid; requiring employers to contribute to costs; and mandating everyone to buy insurance. All Americans (though not all immigrants – documented or not) will get health insurance – or so the hopeful want to believe.

Their hope is born out of desperation. Most advocates are painfully aware that health care is treated as a market commodity in the United States, and that market rules are stacked against those with little purchasing power. And these are usually the very people who need health care the most: poor people and people with serious health issues. In a blatant affront to the basic human rights principle of equity, minority groups and poorer communities in rural and inner city areas suffer disproportionally from market barriers to health care. Read more

Two recent reports emphasize that significant global climate change has already begun, and that it has had “catastrophic” effects on human populations, primarily those living in developing nations. The first report, from the US Global Change Research Program, warns that “warming of the climate is unequivocal” and that climate-related changes that effect natural resources, agriculture, and human health have already occurred. Major consequences of continued climate change include an increase in heat-related illnesses and deaths, more health-related problems caused by poor air quality, and increased transmission of food-, water-, and insect-borne diseases.

This report, which compiled past scientific work on the effects of climate change, also warned that severe weather events, along with the physical and mental health problems associated with them, are likely to increase, especially in countries with less developed public health systems. In general, vulnerable groups such as the elderly, children, and people living in poverty experience more severe health effects from climate change. The report states that “[t]he greatest health burdens related to climate change are likely to fall on the poor…” because they often lack resources and choices in their ability to avoid harm. In particular, the report noted that the poor and elderly faced the most severe circumstances during Hurricane Katrina, and that Native Americans are uniquely vulnerable to global warming because they often rely on reservation land for their livelihood and cannot easily relocate. Read more

Miami Herald photographer Patrick Farrell has been awarded the Pulitzer Prize for his photographs of victims of the four hurricanes that devastated Haiti during the summer of 2008.

During four visits to Haiti, Farrell documented the plight of victims who faced blow after blow of hurricanes and tropical storms, on top of existing suffering in the poorest country in the Western hemisphere. His photographs helped raise international awareness of the damage wreaked by the storms and of Haitians’ struggle for survival.

Since the storms, agriculture has far from recovered, children are severely malnourished, and heavy deforestation will allow hurricanes to continue to devastate the poor nation, according to IPS. Although people are no longer lying dead in the streets, the world should not forget about Haiti.

To view Farrell’s moving photographs, click here.

More links below the fold. Read more

As the nationwide crisis in the housing and credit markets unfolds, a community-based coalition of health care and social service providers, affordable housing developers, and community organizers convened on October 10, 2008 to highlight human rights-based solutions to the crisis in one of America’s hardest-hit communities, South Los Angeles.

Read and hear coverage of this report from 89.3 KPCC, NPR Radio in Los Angeles!

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