Thursday, March 01, 2007

The Health Care Empire Strikes Back

And the budget battle rages on........andy


Responding to Spitzer

Here is the second ad from the groups opposing Eliot Spitzer's plan to reduce health care spending.
-- Azi Paybarah


and............Liz Benjamin brings us......

No More Mr. Nice Guys

One day after Gov. Eliot Spitzer released a TV ad calling them “the usual special interests” and “crybabies” for opposing his Medicaid cuts, SEIU/1199 and the Greater New York Hospital Association are hitting back - hard.
Unlike their first ad, which avoided taking a direct hit at the governor and professed to agree with his call for healthcare reform (although not the way he’s going about it), this new ad assails Spitzer for having “no plan” to provide every New Yorker with health insurance.
The ad features a clip of Spitzer himself saying: “What we are doing is insuring 2.6 million New Yorkers.” But SEIU/1199 and GNYHA insist Spitzer’s budget actually “leaves 2.5 million people without insurance.”
The union and hospital association notes that Spitzer allocated $10.6 million in his budget toward covering uninsured children. Coupled with $19.5 million in federal funds, that comes to a total of $30.1 million.
That’s not enough, SEIU/1199 and GNYHA say, to cover all of the roughly 400,000 children currently uninsured in New York, not to mention all of the 2.6 million people total (adults and kids) who don’t have coverage.
One person who might find some satisfaction out of this (if he’s even paying attention these days): Former Gov. George Pataki. He was on the receiving end of harsh ads by SEIU/1199 and GNYHA that took him personally to task for Medicaid cuts that they maintained would result in closed emergency rooms and poor patient care.
The script:
“Announcer: Eliot Spitzer says he has a plan to cover all new yorkers who don’t have health insurance.
Clip of Spitzer: “What we are doing is insuring 2.6 million New Yorkers.”
Announcer: “The fact is, he has no plan. In fact, the governor’s budget leaves 2.5 million people without insurance and it cuts$1 billion from our hospitals and nursing homes.”
“We need a real plan to lower drug prices, make HMOs pay their fair share, and provide health insurance to everyone.”
“Governor, real reform means putting patients first.”

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