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Healthcare Reform Update for The National Nurses
Movement—Great News!
Registered Nurses and our healthcare activist allies have won
a major victory: guaranteed, single-payer healthcare will be
heard in the halls of power, as we have now confirmed with
Speaker Nancy Pelosi that the "Weiner amendment," will receive a
full debate and vote on the floor of the House this morning.
This is great news.
This vote is the opportunity for our elected officials to go
on the record in support of the only universal, comprehensive,
cost-effective solution to the health care crisis. It is a key
part of the “nurses agenda” that every one of our
patients have access to guaranteed healthcare, and this is how
we can help make that happen.
There are currently 87 cosponsors of HR 676, but this vote
will make it clear which elected officials are truly with
single-payer, Medicare for All.
This vote has come about directly because of the work that
you have done. The more votes we can muster for this truly
humane healthcare policy, the more clear it will become to
official Washington that they must think about the interests of
our patients—not the profits of insurance
corporations.
We have won this vote, and this debate, as part of a long
campaign. Just this morning, labor unions from across
the country, led by CNA/NNOC, the AFL-CIO and the Labor Campaign
for Guaranteed Healthcare, placed the attached full-page ad in
Roll Call. The ad calls for the support of the Weiner
Amendment which would substitute HR 676 Medicare for All
legislation for the main House healthcare reform bill.
Earlier this week, Speaker Pelosi and key Congressional
leaders like George Miller and Henry Waxman heard loud and clear
from their local constituents that they wanted
single-payer. Their offices were flooded with thousands of
calls, and each faced sit-ins demanding this vote.
Here are pictures of twelve activists--many from the
California School Employees Association--proudly displaying
their arrests warrants for holding a sit-in on Tuesday at the
offices of Speaker Pelosi. CSEA has been a ally of ours in
the fight for single-payer, along with Healthcare Now, the
Progressive Democrats of America, and Physicians for a National
Health Program.
11 arrested during sit-in at Speaker
Pelosi's San Francisco office. November 2009.
The Weiner Amendment could be considered as early as the
afternoon of Friday, Nov. 6 so we need you to act today.
Click to call your
members of congress.
Tell them that you:
- Support the the national nurses movement’s endorsement
of the Weiner Amendment (for single-payer healthcare reforms).
- Explain that, however they vote on the main bill, support
for the Weiner Amendment is crucial for the future of the
movement for real healthcare reform—and invite them to
vote yes on both.
- Ask them to put themselves on the record in support of
healthcare as a fundamental human right!
In solidarity for guaranteed healthcare,
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