A Doctor's Support for John Edwards: A Physician's View of John Edwards

[saracat]

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/11/26/15814/964

A Physician's View of John Edwards (UPDATED)
by leisure
Sun Nov 25, 2007 at 11:44:48 PM PST
I came across a comment that said physicians would not support John Edwards because of his past medical malpractice litigation against doctors, and felt I needed to respond.

I'm an MD. Family practice and emergency medicine trained, working emergency medicine for the past 10 years.

I have a duty to provide compassionate, standard-of-care medicine to all my patients, and I take that responsibility seriously.

But it's a tough job for physicians to do consistently, without error, for each of the tens of thousands of patients they will see over the course of their career.

Gross malpractice occurs sometimes... and when it can be proven, I believe victims should be fairly compensated.

leisure's diary :: ::
I support John Edwards. For many reasons.

Universal healthcare is a big one for me-- the sick and injured must be cared for with decency and respect.

ALL of them.

And not just when they're on death's door in the Emergency Department where care is federally mandated. Cost effectiveness, in addition to human decency, requires primary preventative care as well.

In my opinion, nobody but John Edwards stands a chance of achieving Universal Health Care, because nobody but John Edwards is willing to fight the HMOs and risk losing their continued financial support.

Do you know which two United States senators took in the most money from HMOs this current cycle?

#1. Hillary Clinton
#2. Barack Obama

First and second place-- out of all 100 senators, Republican and Democrat.

http://www.opensecrets.org/...

Health Services/HMOs:
Money to Congress

Election cycle: 2008

List: Summary Top 20 Members

Candidate
Amount

Clinton, Hillary (D)
$246,480

Obama, Barack (D)
$175,093

(Chris Dodd is #7 on that list, by the way.)

John Edwards was completely right-- the Clintons had all three branches of government, and they didn't get anything passed that remotely resembled Universal Health Care. Regardless of their true intentions, that's what "sitting at the table" gets you.

John has a history of taking on big HMOs for the little guy and winning. He and Elizabeth are now fighting to bring good health care coverage inexpensively to everyone.

Just like they're fighting to end global warming and our dependence on non-renewable energy.

Just like they're fighting to redeploy the combat troops from Iraq, and bring most of them home to their families.

I can't speak for all physicians, but this physician trusts John Edwards to do the right thing.

Corporate control of congress must come to an end-- now.

We deserve a President who is bought and paid for by the American people.

.
.

UPDATE:

The Clintons had the Executive Branch, the Legislative Branch, and a reasonably balanced Judicial Branch, yet 27 million Americans still LOST their health insurance while Bill Clinton was President.

The percentage of uninsured jumped from 7.4% -> 13.5% between 1992 and 2000. Almost double.



1992 -- 19 million uninsured Americans

Population: 254 million. 7.4% uninsured.

http://www.census.gov/...

2000 -- 38 million uninsured Americans

Population 281 million. 13.5% uninsured.

http://www.census.gov/...

That's what the "sit down at the table" approach gets you.

It's time we elected a fighter.