[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 155 (2009), Part 13]
[House]
[Pages 17052-17053]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           HEALTH CARE REFORM

  (Mr. WU asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. WU. Mr. Speaker, a few years ago on a Mother's Day Sunday, my 
daughter got a cut on her face and was bleeding. So I took her to the 
emergency room. She got a Band-Aid and some antiseptic cream. It was a 
$350 bill.
  A couple years later, I took my son to Central Oregon with me on a 
conference. He jumped from the bed to the fireplace in the hotel, 
missed his landing, split his lip. I took him to the emergency room. He 
got three stitches. He got good treatment. The bill was for $850.
  Why do three stitches cost $850 or a Band-Aid $350?
  Those 49 million uninsured people in America, we are already paying 
for their health care; but it's through the dumbest way that we can, 
through expensive products for some of us, even

[[Page 17053]]

though I have insurance. And what we do need now is change in our 
health care system so that we cover those uninsured because it's not 
only the right thing to do; it is the smart thing to do so that we 
don't have $350 bandages and $850 stitches.

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