Protect Medicare from privatization and expand it to all: Panel today in SF

What: Panel discussion: Protect and expand Medicare; and the status of California's single payer legislation
Where: ILWU Local 6, 255 9th Street, San Francisco
When: Today, Saturday, April 23, 3 to 5 pm
Who:

Greg Brockbank: Chair, Health Care for All-California

Claudia Chaufan MD, PhD: VP of the Physicians for a National Health Program-California, Assistant Professor of Health Policy at UCSF

Michael Lyon: Gray Panthers

Jean Tepperman: Wellstone Democratic Renewal Club

and representatives from California Alliance for Retired Americans and Single Payer Now

Today, Saturday, April 23, in San Francisco, a panel of experts and activists will discuss the current threat to Medicare posed by Congressional conservatives and what we can do about it. Congressman Paul Ryan and the Republicans have proposed that we "save" Medicare by converting it into a voucher program, which single payer advocates say would subsidize health insurance companies, but not provide adequate coverage to seniors in the future--it would essentially destroy Medicare. In contrast, single payer advocates want to protect Medicare and expand it to everyone in the country. Medicare-for-all, also known as single payer healthcare, would eliminate the health insurance industry and replace it with a single government office, much as Medicare program does for seniors today, which would give everyone in the country lower cost and universal access to healthcare. Don Bechler, chair of Single Payer Now, says: "Anyone who cares about the current and ongoing abysmal lack of equitable access to health care in the United States should demand that President Obama and Congress not only protect Medicare but expand it to everyone in the country, via HR 676, the federal legislation that would establish a single payer system in our country". The latest developments in regard to California's single payer legislation, SB 810, will also be discussed.