healthcare

Important Victory! Vermont Senate Passed S.88!

MONTPELIER - On Wednesday, April 7, the Vermont Senate passed S.88 by an overwhelming majority of 28-2. Passage of this bill by the Senate is a major step toward recognizing the human right to healthcare in Vermont and is an important victory for the "Healthcare Is A Human Right" Campaign. The bill calls for the hiring of consultants to design three health care models, one of which must be a single payer system that is administered by government, publicly financed and decoupled from employment. All three of the models must meet the Healthcare is a Human Right principles of universal access and coverage, be comprehensive and affordable, be transparent in design and must ensure public participation in the design, implementation, evaluation, and accountability. The designs also have to include implementation timelines beginning no later than July, 2012.

"If Vermont Leads, The Rest of the Nation Will Follow"

A short film about the Healthcare Is A Human Right Campaign released March 2010.

"Vermont's Own"

Friday March 5, 2010
http://www.benningtonbanner.com/opinion/ci_14522731

Vermont supporters of meaningful health care reform have been floating a well-tested format that deserves more than a cursory review this year. Regardless of what happens -- or doesn't happen -- in Washington, they say,
the state would fare better with its own single-payer health care option.

Any healthcare worker can tell you the truth about mandatory overtime: it is unsafe for their patients, and unsafe for themselves. We need to ensure that our health care workers are able to do their job to the best of their ability, which means keeping them healthy, and not forcing them to work grueling, extended shifts above the hard work they do every day.

HAITI - Nurses and Technical Professionals at FAHC who are members of the Vermont Federation of Nurses and Health Professionals, the union of 2000 members at FAHC, are organizing donations and groups of volunteers to go to Haiti in the coming days, weeks and months to help with the relief efforts.

4000+ Postcards Delivered to Statehouse to Kickoff Push For Vermont To Make Healthcare A Public Good

"We urge you to stand up and take the lead!"

MONTPELIER - More than two hundred Vermonters from the Vermont Worker's Center "Healthcare Is A Human Right Campaign (HCHR)" filled the Cedar Creek room at the Statehouse today, coming from all over the state, to deliver thousands of postcards to the leadership of the State Legislature and to take action on the two single-payer healthcare bills, S.88 and H.100, and mend the broken healthcare system this year.

"We came here today because we seek to change what is politically possible in the healthcare reform process," said Susan Lucas, RN president of the nurses union at Copley Hospital. "We believe that healthcare is not a commodity but a public good shared by all. The time is now to make healthcare a basic fundamental right for every single person"

MORRISVILLE, VT – More than fifty Lamoille County residents braved frigid temperatures to participate in a People’s Forum on Healthcare with Vermont Speaker of the House Rep. Shap Smith (D-Morrisville), Rep. Floyd Nease (D-Johnson) and State Senator Susan Bartlett (D-Lamoille County). This forum was the ninth of its kind scheduled in recent weeks by the Healthcare Is A Human Right Campaign (HCHR), a statewide grassroots organizing effort coordinated by the Vermont Workers’ Center (VWC) which aims to change what is politically possible in health reform in Vermont.

http://www.timesargus.com/article/RH/20091214/NEWS03/912140360

Vt. health reform tops Jan. agenda

By DANIEL BARLOW Vermont Press Bureau - Published: December 14, 2009

MONTPELIER – Vermont lawmakers will begin a new year of health care reform discussions with a massive public hearing at the Statehouse in early January.