By Anne Scheetz

If you try to sign our petition in support of the Illinois Universal Health Care Act, chances are you will receive an "error" message stating that the site can't match your 9-digit zip code to an Illinois legislative district.

The problem came to our attention in late January, and we believe it is due to the redistricting that took place at the beginning of this year--that is, the difficulty lies in the way our website interfaces with the Board of Elections records that match every address in the state to city, county, state, and federal electoral districts.

Published on-line by Kaiser Health News.

By Phil Galewitz

KHN Staff Writer

Dec 29, 2011

HARTFORD, Conn. -- In the past decade, most states have turned Medicaid over to private plans with hopes they could control costs and improve care. Nearly half of the 60 million people in the government program for the poor are now in the managed care plans run by insurance giants such as UnitedHealthcare and Aetna.

But Connecticut, the "insurance capital of the world," is bucking the trend.

Why the HIV community (and everybody else) should support single-payer health care
By Sue Saltmarsh

Published in Positively Aware, on-line, March-April 2011

Reuters By Julie Steenhuysen and Jilian Mincer, December 24, 2011

CHICAGO/NEW YORK (Reuters) - On a recent shift at a Chicago emergency department, Dr. William Sullivan treated a newly homeless patient who was threatening to kill himself.

"He had been homeless for about two weeks. He hadn't showered or eaten a lot. He asked if we had a meal tray," said Sullivan, a physician at the University of Illinois Medical Center at Chicago and a past president of the Illinois College of Emergency Physicians.

Sullivan said the man kept repeating that he wanted to kill himself. "It seemed almost as if he was interested in being admitted."

By Phil Galewitz, Staff Writer, Kaiser Health News

In northwest Indiana, Carrie Sota visits five or six doctors' offices every work day as part of her new sales job.

But Sota isn't selling the physicians on a prescription drug or a medical device. She's promoting her hospital — the University of Chicago Medical Center.

By Jacqueline Traynere

Published in the Herald-News, December 30, 2011.

The story on the Babec family (Dec. 11) sounded all too familiar to me.

When Jennifer Babec described her family struggle due to the illness of a child, her husband losing his job and the stoke, the cliche of “when it rains it pours” seemed like an understatement.

The family survived, even thrived, in the end, a happy ending especially the part about the blood drives.

Each week, I hear about similar situations, where a family loses a home or files bankruptcy due to the cost of health insurance.

By Jeanine Valrie

The following is an excerpt from her blog post of December 21, 2011, based on her participation in the December 10 Occupy Chicago teach-in on health disparities in Chicago.

In thinking about access, race, and the current state of affairs for maternal and child health care (i.e. birth justice) I can’t help but have a few questions about how this system [a single-payer health care system] will support low income, mothers of color.

By Giudi Weiss

Health disparities are the result of a lot of factors: disparities in education and income, racism, geographic isolation, and more.

But what gives these factors their power to wreak damage on people’s health? It’s our profit-based, market-driven health care system. The current system puts up financial barriers that keep people from getting optimal health care. It gives providers – doctors, hospitals, outpatient centers, technology centers – incentives to locate in areas where people are well insured. It drives them to offer services for which they’ll be well paid.

By Anne Scheetz

How would a single-payer health care system provide for the care of severe mental illness? Ilene Flannery Wells posed this question to us as part of her ongoing crusade to spare other people with severe mental illness, and their families, the suffering endured by her twin brother Paul in the years before his death in 2008.

Published on Tuesday, November 29, 2011 by CommonDreams.org

Does the U.S. Have the World's Best Health Care System?

Yes, If You're Talking About the Third World

by Wendell Potter

A little more than a year ago, on the day after the GOP regained control of the House of Representatives, Speaker-to-be John Boehner said one of the first orders of business after he took charge would be the repeal of health care reform.