I agree with the gist of your editorial "Health care study bill is logical step forward" (April 11) that supporting a study of different options is a small but rational step forward to achieving universal access to health care in Vermont in a fiscally responsible way.
However, the editorial needs to take a broader look in crediting the many parties that made the passage of this legislation possible. For instance, you assert that leaders in both houses dismissed chances of passing a health care reform bill this year. In fact, Senate President Pro Tempore Peter Shumlin was an early supporter not only of the bill that passed, but of the single-payer concept. And, he was one of many Senate co-sponsors of the original S.88, which was a single-payer bill. In addition, this spring, Sen. Shumlin invited professor William Hsiao of Harvard University, who designed the single-payer system in Taiwan, to testify before a joint session of the Health and Senate Health Care committees. Surely, professor Hsiao’s testimony about designing universal health care systems (to a standing-room-only crowd), was also an impetus for the final bill’s passage. I think it is also important to note that the original S.88 was hardly a fringe bill even at its earliest inception, but had the support of nearly half of the Senate (14 senators overall).
Similarly, the Health Care is a Human Right campaign deserves enormous credit for holding meetings across the state this year on health care. But, in addition, many other groups sponsored health care forums across the state as well, including forums initiated by local community groups in towns such as Middlebury, White River Junction, Burlington, Norwich, Montpelier and Ripton. We should also not forget the strong representation of single-payer supporters in all three health care meetings held by Sen. Bernie Sanders last summer.
The push for universal health care, and particularly universal publicly funded health care or single-payer, is coming from a diverse group of people and legislators. This indicates that support for this concept in Vermont is broad and deep and goes well beyond a single constituency or interest group.
Ellen Oxfeld lives in Middlebury.