Health Care and Financial Crisis

In the July/August 2011 issue of Public Citizen News Dr. Sidney Wolfe, co-founder and director of Public Citizen's Health Research Group was asked, "What is the key to solving the crisis of health?"

"Eliminating the private insurance industry and having a Medicare-for-All (single-payer) system would save upwards of $400 billion a year and provide enough money to cover all Americans."

My brother is a doctor. I asked him the same question a year ago. He gave the same answer, adding that, as a doctor, he would not like it, because he would be locked into the rates set by a single entity, but as a consumer and citizen, he thought it was the way to go.

Four hundred billion dollars a year in savings. How is it that we do not make this a litmus test for our Senators and Congressmen? There may be reasonable arguments against a single-payer system, but do they stack up against saving $400 billion dollars a year?