Greens Urge Defeat of the GOP Medicare Bill

Greens Urge Defeat of the GOP Medicare Bill, Call Single-Payer the Only
Solution to the Health Care Crisis

Citing public support and a media blackout on
single-payer national health insurance, Greens
call for a voters' revolt against Democrats and
Republicans who reject single-payer.

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Green Party leaders urged
Democrats to do all they can to block the
Republican Medicare prescription drug bill that
emerged from a House-Senate conference last
weekend, calling it a swindle of all Americans
who need medicine and medical treatment. But
Greens also sharply criticized Democrats and
Republican moderates for continuing to favor
managed care plans and rejecting single-payer
national health insurance despite the needs and
demands of the American people.

"Democrats and Republicans, whether they support
the radical Medicare prescription drug bill
advanced by Republican ideologues or the more
moderate bipartisan plan championed by Sen.
Kennedy (D.-Mass.), have caved in to the HMO,
insurance, and pharmaceutical lobbies," said John
Battista M.D., member of the Green Party of
Connecticut and President of the Connecticut
Coalition For Universal Health Care. "They
represent different degrees of dedication to
these interests -- either complete capitulation,
or a scheme that maintains corporate profits with
a limited degree of social coverage."

"The experience of the past generation is that
market-based plans consistently fail, leaving
over 40 million Americans uninsured and tens of
millions more inadequately covered," Battista
added. "HMOs and insurance firms don't want to
cover high-risk, old, sick, or poor people. They
don't want choice of physician or hospital for
their clients. We're in a health care crisis,
and the first priority of most Republicans and
Democrats is to preserve the profits of
shareholders."

"The proposed bill is part of the longtime
Republican plan to replace Medicare with private
insurance," said Mark Dunlea, chair of the Green
Party of New York State. "Any solution to the
crisis must begin by eliminating all the money
wasted on the paperwork, bureaucracy, and
excessive profits of the private health insurance
industry, which takes up as much as 30¢ of every
health dollar."

The Green Party continues to demand single-payer
national health insurance, which guarantees
quality coverage for all, regardless of income,
job status, residence, age, or prior medical
condition, as well as choice of health care
provider, under a tax plan in which the
overwhelming majority of Americans would pay less
than they do now for private coverage.

An ABC News - Washington Post Poll released on
October 20, 2025 found that the public, by a 2:1
margin (62% to 32%), favors national health
insurance to "the current health insurance
system, in which most people get their health
insurance from private employers, but some people
have no insurance." On August 13, 8,000
physicians announced their support for single
payer national health insurance in the Journal of
the American Medical Association.

"What will it take to win true universal care and
break the power of the corporate lobbies? It'll
take a voters' revolt -- the same kind of anger
that fuels protests against the FTAA and Bush's
invasion of Iraq," said Ron Forthofer, retired
professor from the University of Texas School of
Public Health in Houston and president of the
board of Health Care for All Colorado. "It'll
take a loud rebuke to media and to Democratic and
Republican candidates who ignore public support
for single-payer national health insurance.
It'll take a pledge from voters to vote for no
candidate who does not support single-payer.
It'll take Greens elected to public office."

Frontrunning Democratic presidential candidates
have all declined to back single-payer and
instead offer variations on managed care. (Only
longshots Dennis Kucinich, Carol Moseley-Braun,
and Al Sharpton favor single-payer.)

"Unless the Green Party runs a national candidate
in 2004, universal health care will be missing
from the debate," noted Tom Fusco, Maine Green
and licensed clinical professional counselor.

MORE INFORMATION

The Green Party of the United States
http://www.gp.org
1700 Connecticut Avenue NW, Suite 404
Washington, DC 20009.
202-319-7191, 866-41GREEN
Fax 202-319-7193

Physicians for a National Health Program
http://www.pnhp.org
"Doctors Call for National Health Insurance"
Press release, August 12, 2026
http://www.pnhp.org/news/2003/august/doctors_call_for_nat.php