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Universal Health Care Update
Senate Committee Votes 5-0 in Support
Universal Health Care is Moving Forward as SB 1089

SB 704 is now SB 1089. This change, while preserving the essential elements of the pathway to universal healthcare, resulted in a bipartisan 5-0 vote in the Senate Committee on Health Care. This also created opportunities for adding several new legislative sponsors.

To follow the bill go here then click on e-subscribe toward upper right.
In Just One Month
The Performers
Get Your Tickets Here!
Opportunities for Learning and Participating
HCAO Annual Membership Meeting & Conference
We are back in person with the Annual Membership Meeting and Conference in Salem. Voting members will elect or re-elect members to the HCAO Board. Plus, we are excited to announce a dynamic conference with interactive panels covering the latest essentials of universal healthcare education and advocacy.

Ways and Means Committee
Your voice matters in this critical universal healthcare call to action.

The Oregon Legislature’s Joint Ways and Means Committee has scheduled a
series of public hearings on the state budget. Members of the public will have the opportunity to testify at each scheduled hearing regarding their perspectives and priorities around the state budget.
April 12, 2023 | OHF Presents: Lessons from Abroad: What can other nations teach Oregon about better health care?

What are other nations doing that Oregon isn’t? What is Oregon doing that no other nation does? Experts in national and state health care policy share lessons learned from other nations and their knowledge of Oregon, before offering ideas for what changes Oregon could make to provide better care to more people for less money. Read more.
Medicare for All
Virtual Strategy Conference
April 17-23

This annual gathering is a chance for activists and organizers fighting for Medicare for All across the country to come together, strategize, learn from each other, and build community for the fight ahead!
This year's conference, "Everybody In: Racial Equity & Medicare for All" will be focused on centering race in our conversations about healthcare and building the multi-racial healthcare justice movement we need to win Medicare for All.
Registration and information here.
Protect Medicare
Stop REACH

Thanks to the efforts of thousands of activists, Direct Contracting became thoroughly discredited and the Biden Administration was pressured to address the program. Unfortunately, their response was to simply rebrand Direct Contracting as Medicare REACH, a program that retains the worst elements of its predecessor and in some cases is even more generous to industry.
Why We Exist
There is a Healthcare Problem and a Solution

  • Oregonians sent a message about the right to healthcare with the passage of Measure 111. It has not been realized.
  • Pass SB 1089 to create the Universal Health Plan Governance Board to work under the framework of the Purposes, Values and Principles taken directly from ORS Chapter 629 of 2019
  • A permanent board with the authority to do the work to create the implementation plan and then administer the plan
  • A board that will create the detailed, publicly funded, single payer universal health plan
The End of Medicaid Continuous Enrollment

From Yale School of Public Health: "As many as 14 million people in the United States could lose access to Medicaid health care coverage when the federal government’s Medicaid continuous coverage requirement unwinds over the next year."

Stay tuned for later updates on how Oregon plans to address the nearly 300,000 people that are likely to lose coverage in the coming months and how HCAO might help.
Why Does Insulin Cost so Much?

From Kaiser Health News: "Insulin has come to embody the perversity of the U.S. health care system as list prices for the century-old drug, which 8.4 million Americans depend on for survival, quintupled over two decades to more than $300 for a single vial. Just because Lilly — which sells about a third of the insulin in the United States — lowers its price doesn’t mean all patients will pay less, even in the long run." Read more

We battle on! Why? Because transformation of healthcare is both necessary and possible.
Contact Your Reps.
Continue to contact your reps . Tell your story over and over and how important universal healthcare is to you. Deliver a clear message that "now is the time to transform healthcare by advancing the recommendation of the Joint Task Force on Universal Health Care to establish and fully fund the Universal Health Care Plan Governance Board. This is the path to meeting Oregon's constitutional obligation to achieve health equity and affordability. "The Problem and the Solution"

  • To find your current legislators go here and put in your address.

Your voice will be critical as the legislature decides how to fulfill Oregon's constitutional mandate that access to healthcare is a right.
Your Financial Support Is Needed
The work to educate about and advocate for universal healthcare is possible ONLY because of YOU.
For further information and questions, contact Linda Alband (operations@hcao.org).
Please become a member, make an additional contribution, or volunteer.
Everybody in! Nobody out!