[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 155 (2009), Part 19]
[House]
[Pages 25550-25557]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                        PROGRESSIVE CAUCUS HOUR

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 6, 2009, the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Ellison) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
  Mr. ELLISON. Let me thank the Speaker for recognizing us today. And 
let me also thank Mr. Jared Polis, who will be joining me today for the 
Progressive Caucus hour.
  We come together every week to talk about a progressive vision for 
America, a progressive vision, one that says, look, we all count, we 
all matter, we all need health care, we all need clean air, clean 
water, food free of pesticides, and now we all need health care. We 
need health care that works for everybody. We need to cover the 
uninsured. We need to stop the escalating costs for those of us who may 
have health care but see our premiums rise and rise and rise, doubled 
over the last 10 years, doubling over the next 10.
  So tonight, Mr. Speaker, we come together to talk about health care, 
to talk about the fact that we are within grasp of major health care 
reform. The American people not only want it, they demand it, and they 
demonstrated their interests in the last election, which not only 
landed Barack Obama in the White House, but landed us in firm 
majorities in both the House of Representatives and the Senate.
  So let me invite you and yield to Mr. Polis of the great State of 
Colorado, who will share a few remarks as we jump into this subject of 
health care.
  Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I rise to share with you stories of real 
people and how health care impacts real American lives every day.
  One of my constituents from Westminster, Colorado, Barbara Graham, 
contacted me the other day and shared her story that I want to share 
with you.

[[Page 25551]]

  In 1970, Barbara's daughter was born with cystic fibrosis. The 
longest period of time she went without being hospitalized was 7 
months. At that point, they had insurance, and Barbara told me that 
unlike today's insurance, it covered all of her stays and it didn't 
cost them an arm and a leg. Unfortunately, her daughter died 6 weeks 
before her eighth birthday. Her son was born with cystic fibrosis in 
1976. He is still alive, but because of his condition, today he has no 
health insurance. He is self-employed, and he couldn't begin to afford 
the cost of insurance with a preexisting condition like cystic 
fibrosis.
  His and his mother Barbara's daily thoughts are, how long can they 
get help from the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, from family members 
trying to patch together what they need to help with his medication and 
his needs? How long can her son stay healthy enough not to be 
hospitalized because hospital stays have cost him everything? He can 
never accumulate assets, his hospital stays wipe him out. The last time 
he was sick he was turned away. His mother has watched him where he can 
hardly get a breath of air without thinking that it might be his last.
  Yes, Barbara tells me, our country needs help with the health care 
industry. Barbara says that having an illness and a preexisting 
condition is not elective, and it's a shame that insurance companies 
control how and when a person is treated. Barbara watched--and how 
difficult it is for any parent to watch--one of her children die 
because of our health care system, and she fears and she writes that 
she will probably watch her son die before his time because of his 
inability to access health care.
  Barbara wants us in Congress to remember those who can't help 
themselves because of illness. Well, in the health care reform plan 
before us, we ban pricing discrimination based on preexisting 
conditions. Through creating exchanges, we allow people like Barbara's 
son, who is self-employed, to have access to a low-cost option with 
some of the same negotiating leverage that a 10,000 or 100,000-person 
company might have through an exchange which allows for great choices 
between many private insurers and the public option. He would also 
receive affordability credits depending on his income--for an 
individual up to 300 times poverty, up to about $42,000 a year in 
income. Barbara's son will receive affordability credits to buy the 
insurance that he needs through the exchange, which will be affordable 
because they won't be able to discriminate based on his preexisting 
condition.
  It is for families like Barbara's and to make American families 
stronger that the United States Congress needs to pass health care 
reform.
  Thank you, and I yield back to my friend from Minnesota.
  Mr. ELLISON. Let me thank the gentleman for yielding. And I will be 
yielding back to the gentleman in a moment.
  It's so important that we keep this conversation real, real people 
going through real things. I want to thank you for bringing the story 
of that family to the floor of the House today. They deserve to be 
heard.
  This is the progressive message, the Progressive Caucus Special Order 
hour, and I just want to share a few things.
  As the gentleman from Colorado talks about real stories, let me talk 
about things a little more globally. Let me say that there are 
highlights that you need to know about regarding whether the American 
people want health care or not.
  The majority has now backed two key and controversial provisions, 
both the so-called ``public option'' and the new mandate requiring all 
Americans to carry health insurance. Polling has demonstrated that the 
American people support both. Independents and senior citizens, two 
groups crucial to the debate, have warmed to the idea of the public 
insurance option. Fifty-seven percent of all Americans now favor a 
public insurance option. The fact is, 56 percent of all Americans favor 
a provision mandating that all Americans buy insurance because 
Americans know that if you decide to not get insurance and all the rest 
of us do, when you get sick, we are surely going to take care of you. 
So everybody has to help out and do what's right as part of this.
  The number rises to 71 percent, should the government provide 
subsidies for many low-income Americans to help them purchase 
insurance; 71 percent of Americans say that we should do that.
  I want to yield back to the gentleman. Maybe if you have some more 
stories, you can share them; otherwise, I can keep running down how 
things are going more globally.
  I also want to share some stories tonight, but if you've got a few 
ready to roll, let me hand it back to the gentleman from Colorado.
  Mr. POLIS. I thank the gentleman from Minnesota.
  I rise to share stories of real people that highlight the urgent need 
for health care reform.
  Eileen Fink of Colorado Springs is what we might think of as a soccer 
mom. Her kids, she told me, have a reputation for being involved in 
sports. They are a healthy and athletic family, but they, like many 
American families, lost their health care insurance. They encourage 
their kids to power on, play sports, have fun, live a normal and happy 
childhood. No one in their family was reckless, but they had a bad year 
when they racked up several orthopedic injuries in a short time with no 
insurance. This could happen to any family. Their daughter racked up 
over $10,000 in bills after a fall that required reconstructive surgery 
and steel rods in her bones. Their other daughter fell ice skating, 
broke her wrist. That was a $3,000 bill. Finally, their 14-year-old son 
broke his wrist, and feeling sorry for the family's financial 
predicament, he hid that for 9 days; he didn't tell his parents that 
his wrist was in pain or what he was suffering from. One night he 
finally said, Mom, I think I broke my wrist a while back, but I didn't 
want to make you cry about the bills. It turned out it was broken on a 
growth plate. The police came to question Eileen about the delay in 
treatment. Ultimately, it was her son who tried to protect his own 
family from the bills, hence the delay in treatment. What does that 
teach him about access to health care? Eileen feels terrible that her 
son suffered so long trying to save the family financially.
  Eileen asked us in Congress to help hardworking families like hers. 
And she added that, by the way, my husband is Republican, but sees this 
as an important issue, too.
  Families are bipartisan, families are nonpartisan. Whether they're 
registered to vote, whether they vote, whether they're Republican, when 
they're independent, whether they're green, whether they're 
libertarian, whether they're Democrat, what kind of system forces a 14-
year-old kid not to tell his parents that he's hurt because he's 
worried about his mother crying because they can't afford the 
treatment?
  Under health care reform now before Congress, families like the Fink 
family would have the option of getting insurance through the exchange, 
a low-cost option that people who are self-employed or work for small 
businesses would have that would give them the same negotiating power 
and leverage as multinational corporations. Families like the Finks 
would also receive affordability credits and have the guarantee that 
they would have no more than $10,000 out of pocket in medical expenses 
each year, preventing them from bankruptcy and from having to worry and 
having to worry their children about the cost of medical care.
  It is urgent that this United States Congress keep families like the 
Finks in mind, soccer moms and soccer dads across the country, any of 
whom could be affected by the breakdown and the failures of our current 
medical system.
  It's for families like the Finks that I call upon my colleagues in 
the United States Congress to pass health care reform and send it to 
President Obama's desk before the end of the year.
  Thank you. I yield to the gentleman from Minnesota.
  Mr. ELLISON. Let me thank the gentleman for yielding.
  The gentleman is doing a great job highlighting what Americans are 
going through. Americans of all descriptions--Americans in the suburbs,

[[Page 25552]]

Americans in the city, Americans in the rural areas, Americans in the 
East, the West, the Midwest, the South, all over America people need 
health care reform. They need it if they have health care through their 
job; they need it if they don't have it at all. We need health care 
reform and we need it now. The American people have sent a resounding 
message, and it's up to the American Congress to act now and not play 
politics.

                              {time}  2030

  Because, as the gentleman pointed out, even if you are a registered 
Republican, or a registered Democrat, no matter what you are registered 
for, the fact is that when you have an injury or an illness in your 
family and you have to consider what to do, given the costs that you 
will face or all the other implications, you don't really think about 
politics, you think about getting some care that you can afford. So the 
Congress has to be responsible and do the right thing.
  Let me just say this, just a few stats. These are stats I am talking 
about. The gentleman from Colorado has been talking about real-life 
stories. Let me paint a more global picture for a moment, and I will 
yield back.
  Forty-two percent of Americans have changed their health care 
coverage in the last 5 years. Thirty-eight percent of Americans worry 
they will lose their health care coverage in the next 5 years. That is 
a lot of people. Almost 40 percent are worried they will lose their 
health care coverage. That is a big deal.
  The fact is that from 2003 to 2007, about 36 percent of Americans 
either experienced gaps in their insurance or relied on government 
insurance for all or part of their coverage. That is a lot of people, 
fully a third. Fully a third of Americans in that 4-year period had 
gaps in their insurance or had to rely on government to keep things 
afloat for their family. This is a big deal.
  A few more stats I would like to share before I yield back to the 
gentleman from Colorado. According to The Urban Institute, as many as 
one in five uninsured Americans is uninsured because of a change in or 
loss of job. When you lose your job, you lose your health care 
insurance, unless you can keep up with COBRA. But then, of course, that 
is on you to pay for, and if you don't have a job, you might not be 
able to cover that COBRA.
  The fact is that people are suffering in individual homes, in 
apartments, on farms that they live on across America, and they are 
struggling in large numbers when we aggregate them and look at them 
statistically. They are dealing with a lot of tough things out there, 
and it is time for Congress to act.
  Let me say in 2008, the average cost of an individual plan was about 
$4,704. That is 2008. A family plan was $12,608. $12,000. That is an 
enormous amount of money in the course of a year. These numbers will 
double in the next 10 years, eating up a greater percentage of the 
family budget, chewing into expenditures that the family has to make 
for vital things just to be able to make it and just to be able to do 
well.
  The reality is the time for change is now. No more delay, no more 
scare tactics, no more stories about community schools, about sex 
clinics; no more stories about death panels or stories about it is only 
covering the uninsured because everybody else has insurance. No, we 
need real reform for everybody. North, west, east, south, we need it 
now.
  I yield back to the gentleman for another one of those great stories 
he has been sharing with us.
  Mr. POLIS. I thank the gentleman from Minnesota. A friend of mine, a 
resident of Thornton, Colorado, but it might as well be Fresno, 
California, or Houston, Texas, or Mobile, Alabama, it doesn't matter, 
Lynn Zimmerman of Thornton shared her story with me. She wants to see a 
public health care option similar to Medicare in this country.
  Two of her sons are working for minimum-wage jobs currently, and they 
can't afford health care insurance. Those in their community that earn 
between $1,000 to $1,200 a month can barely pay rent and car insurance, 
barely put food on the table. How can they expect to pay for health 
care on top of that, which they frequently, in the case of her two 
children, don't receive through their job? Their employers don't offer 
a health care package, and they are no longer college students so they 
can't be on Lynn's plan.
  Lynn is a teacher, and a darn good one. But she shared with me that 
her health care plan has gotten so expensive that it is an issue every 
time the teachers union goes through negotiations with the district.
  The district can't afford health care coverage for their employees. 
In order to afford the health care coverage, teachers have been taking 
pay cuts for a decade. They still get a nominal pay raise, but the 
portion of the health care plan has been raised more each time they 
negotiate, and their take-home pay has been cut.
  Lynn tells us that the current insurance programs spend too much time 
and money trying to deny payment for procedures that are covered under 
their health care plan. Lynn suggests, and with a tremendous amount of 
common sense, why don't we get rid of the people pushing papers and 
denying coverage, the very people that are driving costs in our system?
  That speaks to the critical reason of having a public option as an 
alternative, to provide real competition for insurance companies, so 
insurance companies with exorbitant CEO pay, insurance companies that 
spend the money that we pay them with our premiums hiring people to 
deny the very claims that we retain them to pay out on, will be held 
competitive and forced to be competitive to retain their customers.
  Having a public option which is revenue neutral--they will have only 
the premiums that we allocate to them to pay out in claims--will help 
keep the insurance companies honest in their competition as a critical 
component of health care reform.
  Lynn finally implores Congress to act now and make good on our 
promise to the American people to improve the access and quality of 
health care so that Lynn's sons can have access to an exchange, a low-
cost option that gives them buying insurance as individuals the same 
negotiating leverage as a multinational corporation with 100,000 
people, that gives her sons affordability credits, for an individual up 
to about $42,000 a year. Her sons making $12,000 to $15,000 a year will 
get affordability credits that will pay for almost all of the cost of 
insurance through the exchange.
  What a transformative difference health care reform will make in the 
lives of the Zimmerman family and in the lives of millions of other 
American families like the Zimmerman family that are the backbone of 
America.
  I yield back to the gentleman from Minnesota.
  Mr. ELLISON. Let me join the gentleman from Colorado, Congressman 
Polis, who is doing such a great job, in offering a few stories that 
people are dealing with out here today. We also want to just thank the 
gentlelady from the great State of Illinois. Jan Schakowsky is here 
joining us right now, and as she gets her bags straight and everything, 
I am going to just share one story from a family that is really, really 
working and pulling for real health care reform. Let me say I will just 
leave the last names out just to protect folks.
  Kelly is 50 years old and her husband is 55. They are both retired 
employees. They are retired from an American company. After a 2004 
horseback riding accident, Kelly was in a coma for 3 weeks. Her 
insurer, United Health Care, refused to cover her emergency surgery. To 
this day, Kelly has no memory of the incident.
  David called UHC from the hospital in the waiting room to report the 
incident, but the company denied coverage, saying David hadn't reported 
the incident. On top of that, the company told David the hospital was 
out of network.
  The company, the health insurance company, eventually paid about half 
of Kelly's medical costs, which left the family with about $200,000 in 
bills. $200,000 is a lot of money even if you already have a lot of 
money. But that is how much they had in bills.

[[Page 25553]]

  They were able to hold on to their house, but only by selling almost 
everything else they owned and declaring bankruptcy. Yes, bankruptcy. 
Kelly tried to go back to her job in the computerized drafting field, 
but the brain damage was too severe and she just couldn't do the work 
anymore.
  David, also retired after 20 years as a communications technician, he 
suffered an on-the-job injury to his spine. To this day they pay about 
$1,645 a month, which is a lot of money, to the bankruptcy court, and 
hope to be out of debt one day.
  So that is just one story. But their story could be dramatized by the 
number of people who file for bankruptcy because of medical debt. More 
than half of the bankruptcy filings are due to medical debt that is 
just crippling families. Health care reform will bring that nightmare 
to an end, so we look eagerly towards it.
  I think the gentlewoman from Illinois is ready to hand it to the 
folks, so let me yield to the gentlelady and thank her for coming, Jan 
Schakowsky.
  I yield to the gentlelady from Illinois.
  Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Thank you so much, Mr. Ellison.
  I was watching this wonderful Special Order on television. I wanted 
to share a couple of stories that I have, both from my district and 
from testimony we have recently had at a committee hearing.
  I wanted to tell you about one of my constituents, Marie, who owns a 
candy store in Wilmette, Illinois. After she and her husband were 
denied coverage, they were finally able to find a policy that will cost 
them $1,700 each month in premium and out-of-pocket costs. So how many 
small business entrepreneurs can afford that, particularly in today's 
economy?
  Or take Jim Kelly of Glenview, Illinois, who works for a small 
business that can't afford to provide coverage to its workers. Jim and 
his wife are forced to take, in his words, ``a risk.''
  ``We are paying cash for our medication and hoping that nothing major 
happens until we are eligible for Medicare.''
  Americans shouldn't be asked to gamble their lives, and I think it is 
time for solutions.
  Then in committee we heard from a man named, let's see, his name is 
Bruce Hetrick. This was a panel of small business owners. He said, 
``You should know that I am a hearing-impaired, migraine-suffering, 
diabetic cancer survivor who is also the father of a cancer survivor 
and the widower of a cancer victim. So I have experienced more than my 
fair share of the American health care system.''
  I would add, to say the least. He wasn't whining, believe me. This 
was a very brave guy. But he wanted to share some of his frustrations.
  He said, ``Health care and health coverage inflation is small 
business' enemy number one. My company pays 80 percent of employee 
premiums and 50 percent of dependent premiums. That is higher than 
typical firms like ours, but it helps us attract and retain good 
people. It also leaves us with a painful choice: Either the cost of 
health coverage cuts into our profits, or, if we pass it along to our 
customers, it renders us more expensive.''
  Then he gives us an example of something that happened to him.
  ``My late wife,'' he says, ``Pamela Klein, who was also my business 
partner, was covered by our company's health insurance. In the last 
year of her life, the bill charges for Pam's cancer care totaled 
$300,000. A few months before her death, our health insurance renewal 
came up. Lo and behold, the quoted increase for the health insurance 
portion of our benefits plan, just the increase, was a whopping 28 
percent. That would have been devastating to our business and our 
employees. When Pam died just shy of the actual renewal date, I had our 
rates requoted. With Pam out of the mix, the increase for the very same 
health insurance coverage was just 10 percent.''
  A 28 percent increase reduced to 10 percent because of one person in 
need of care. That is the kind of thing that small businesses are 
facing. The underwriting is based on maybe 5, 10, 15 employees. And I 
wonder what an employer thinks when somebody perhaps with an obvious 
disability walks in? They have got to be thinking, can I really afford 
to hire this person? And that is not right in the United States of 
America.
  I have got another one, but I will yield to either one of you to tell 
us your story.
  Okay, let me tell you about Mick Landauer. He owns a small business, 
and he has been an owner for over 30 years, and one of the perks he 
offers, to quote him, ``I offer the company's group insurance for those 
employees who desire coverage. The cost split is on a 50-50 basis, and 
those costs keep going up.'' He says, ``The rates for employees have 
been rising tremendously. In order to keep them down, our deductible 
has been rising instead. Our monthly premiums are now around $400 for 
an individual, $800 for a family. The deductible is $8,000 for an 
individual policy and $16,000 for a family plan.''
  The muffler shop that he owns ``pays for half the deductible with the 
plan we have now, which is a lot of money.'' He says, ``Last year we 
had deductibles of $4,000 for an individual and $8,000 for a family. 
Two years ago the deductible was at $2,000 for an individual and $4,000 
for a family.'' Then he says, ``I expect deductibles to double once 
again, with monthly rates going up by $500 or $1,000.''
  ``How can this be, you may ask,'' at the committee hearing? ``It is 
because one employee was born with a congenital heart disease. He 
visits a specialist twice a year. A routine visit may cost from $1,200 
to $1,500. Any specialized tests will run $10,000 and up. The employee 
with the heart condition, that is myself.''
  This is a business owner. ``The only way I see to keep our monthly 
rates and deductibles reasonable is by removing myself from the company 
policy.''

                              {time}  2045

  I will not be able to get health insurance anywhere else, as I turned 
down our company group plan that's available to me. So I ask you, what 
options do I have? Pay for my own medical costs, in which case I'd be 
forced to sell the business; quit going to doctors, including the 
congenital heart specialist; or maybe move to Canada, which has a 
national health plan and ultimately being forced to sell my business.
  Are these the choices that we should give to anyone in our country? I 
think maybe I'll move to Canada in order to get covered? Or give up my 
business? This just isn't right. That's why the legislation with the 
robust public option is the answer for people like this.
  Mr. ELLISON. I thank the gentlelady for yielding.
  I'll next yield to the gentleman, Congressman Polis.
  Mr. POLIS. You know what strikes me with the moving stories that my 
colleagues the gentlelady from Illinois has shared and the gentleman 
from Minnesota? You know, it doesn't matter whether you're from Texas 
or Minnesota or Illinois or Arizona or Colorado or New York. Kids 
everywhere get broken wrists. People anywhere could have a congenital 
heart condition. These are not the fault of the individual. These are 
preexisting conditions. It could happen to you. It could happen to me. 
It could happen to your sister, your brother, your cousin.
  We all want to have that there, something there in case our own 
family faces this kind of situation. We all want and should be 
demanding and can demand now, by supporting health care reform, 
preventing discriminating based on preexisting conditions, preventing 
exclusions based on preexisting conditions. The gentleman in the story 
that my colleague and friend from Illinois just shared with us would 
have access to an exchange, a low-cost option that would give him the 
same negotiating leverage as multinational companies with hundreds of 
thousands of people in buying his health care insurance, with a public 
option that would give him the choice and keep the competition and 
ensure that there was intense competition within the exchange.
  Depending on people's income level, up to several hundred percent of 
the poverty line, they will get affordability credits. For a family of 
four, up to

[[Page 25554]]

$70,000 a year in income, they'll get affordability credits. And if 
they don't get their insurance through work, they'll be able to 
purchase them on their own through the exchange. It doesn't matter. 
Could be somebody from Illinois, Minnesota, Colorado, California, 
Texas, New York. These are American families we're talking about, and 
health care reform can help make American families stronger.
  I yield back to the gentleman from Minnesota.
  Mr. ELLISON. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  You know, Congressman Polis, you're hitting the square tonight, as is 
our colleague from Illinois, Congresswoman Schakowsky.
  Let me just take a moment to talk about myths for a moment before I 
hand it back to the gentlelady from Illinois. The fact is that as we 
stand here on the House floor tonight talking about the urgency of 
health care reform now, we want to also convey the idea that this is 
something that every American can participate in and can get involved 
in and can call their Representatives to talk about the importance of 
reform. But let me just talk myths, as I said a moment ago.
  There's this idea out there that the public option is some government 
takeover or even a government-run program. It isn't true. The fact is 
the public option is a program where you'd have private doctors, where 
you would have the doctors of your choice that you could go to. It 
would be a low-cost alternative. And it certainly wouldn't be some kind 
of a takeover thing that they're talking about.
  The idea that mandated health care is a new tax is also false. We're 
paying already for people who aren't covered. If you show up at the 
emergency room, we're taking care of you, so we're already paying. It's 
not a new tax on anybody.
  There are other fallacies we'll talk about, and we'll talk about more 
as the hour wears on, but the fact of the matter is there are myths out 
there that must be debunked. And the American people are smart and they 
know very well what's right and what's good, and that's why a full 
majority continue to support the public option.
  Let me yield to the gentlelady from Illinois.
  Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. I thought you'd be interested in this. We had 
testimony again in the committee from a man named Fred Walker who said, 
I thought it was my duty--he told his own story, but then he says, I 
thought it was my duty to ask friends, family, and mentors their 
opinion on this issue, and so he's paraphrased some of their responses, 
he says. Let's see.
  Jack Grayson, owner of Seminole Realty, and my cousin who looks after 
me like a brother, told an unheard story about the 13-year battle his 
departed wife, Peggy, had with cancer. And I quote, ``The last few 
years our copays were $3,000 to $4,000 a month, and we had good 
insurance. What do the less fortunate do?'' Peggy passed in 2000. Jacks 
says we have to help those who can't afford the proper care.
  Bob Howes, my friend and keyboard player, delivers car paint 2 days a 
week and plays music for money as much as he can to survive. Bob has an 
ongoing battle with skin care and has run out of options for treatment. 
He's conceded death within a few years.
  Bill Walker, my cousin who is an RN and sells pacemakers for St. Jude 
Medical Division. Bill travels a lot and likes the French and the 
Canadian system. Most of my middle-aged, right-wing buddies who live 
week to week could never afford health insurance. Their clock is 
ticking and they don't have a plan.
  And then he says, I'd like to note that while polling my friends and 
family on October 15, I finally found someone who is very happy with 
their health care. Pete and Pat Lamb are dear family friends and over 
70 years old. Their combination of Medicare and coinsurance has 
provided well for them.
  So finally, the people on Medicare are the only people he found that 
were really happy with their health insurance. But we have a bill now 
that's before us, a couple of days now, 2009, historic year, we're 
going to be able to, if we do a bill with a robust public option, make 
sure that every American can afford health care, and we're going to end 
these horror health care stories.
  Mr. ELLISON. The gentleman from Colorado.
  Mr. POLIS. I thank the gentleman from Minnesota for the time.
  I want to share with you the story of Gerry from Boulder, Colorado. 
Several years ago, Gerry wanted to have an MRI on his left shoulder to 
determine the cause of rotator cuff pain that was becoming increasingly 
bothersome and disabling, but it took his insurer, Anthem Blue Cross, 
over a year to approve the procedure. In the meantime, he had to deal 
with that pain every day.
  Gerry also shared that when his son turned 25, he needed to have his 
own health care insurance policy. And his son is healthy but takes an 
antidepressant. As a result, the insurance companies list him, like 
tens of millions of other Americans, with the scarlet letter--a 
preexisting condition. And he has to pay over $300 a month for a basic 
policy for a healthy 25-year-old, and that's despite the fact that his 
doctor wrote to the companies indicating the condition is very stable 
and is not currently in treatment.
  Gerry's doctor now charges a membership fee so that he's able to have 
the ability to see less patients for longer amounts of time. He needs 
to have several clerical staff just to handle the insurance claims of 
the different companies. Each company, of course, requires different 
information.
  Gerry and his wife pay a combined $7,200 a year in health insurance 
premiums, and they have coverage, but they still have to pay about 
$10,000 a year out of pocket for prescription drugs.
  Gerry shares with us that our system may work when you're young and 
healthy, but it fails as you age and need care. What kind of health 
care system fails when you need health care? When you don't need health 
care, it works. When you need health care, it fails.
  Mr. ELLISON. Will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. POLIS. I will.
  Mr. ELLISON. How would you like to have a car like that?
  I yield back.
  Mr. POLIS. That's right. When you don't need to go somewhere, the car 
works fine. The minute you need to get to work, the minute you need to 
go somewhere to visit your family, the car doesn't work. What kind of 
car is that? That's a lemon.
  Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. It works fine. Although, let's remember, you're 
continuing to pay premiums, often very high ones every single month, 
even when you don't need it.
  Mr. POLIS. That's right. And let's say you get in one accident or one 
speeding ticket, you're uninsurable for the rest of your life and you 
can't drive.
  Well, these are our bodies we are talking about, not cars. And if you 
have one illness, one preexisting condition, you are virtually, if you 
try to buy insurance on your own, uninsurable for the rest of your life 
through no fault of your own. And that's what Gerry's son is going 
through at 25. Just takes an antidepressant, healthy kid, can't get 
insurance, pays a lot for a very basic program that isn't even 
comprehensive.
  There are tens of millions of American families like Gerry's and 
others that will benefit from us passing health care reform now.
  Mr. ELLISON. Well, let me share a quick story, and this one I don't 
have written down, but it actually happened to me when I had a town 
hall forum in my district in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and we had a 
packed-out room.
  And I had this friend who was actually helping me get boards that I 
was using for a presentation, and she's just a wonderful person and 
I've known her for many years. And she was running around getting 
boards, getting coffee, helping people out, just sort of getting people 
signed in who showed up. That's the kind of person that she is. She's 
just good people.
  Anyway, she--after it was all over, it was pretty emotional. It 
wasn't bad,

[[Page 25555]]

but it was a strong and powerful time. She said--she gave me one of 
those looks, Mr. Speaker, where it's like she said to me, I've got to 
talk to you. And I said, Okay, because I could have said, you know, 
Don't you see all these people? I'm busy. I'll get with you. I'll call 
you. But the way she looked at me, I said, Okay. So I said, You guys 
hang on.
  So we went over to sort of like the corner of the room as people were 
filing out and she looked at me with eyes full of water. She looked 
like she could cry at that moment, and she said, you know, I just need 
to tell you this. I'm 39 years old. I have two teenage sons. My mother 
and my mother's sister, my aunt, both had breast cancer, and we lost my 
aunt last year. My sister has had a positive diagnosis, a mammogram. 
She's being treated now. I don't know what to do because I know that I 
need to go get the exam, but I also know that if I get it, they're 
probably going to say I have a preexisting condition. I could be 
dropped.
  This young woman, full of life, full of care and concern about 
everyone else, said to me, I'm too young to die. I've got teenagers. 
That's who she's worried about. She said, If I go get the test, they 
could drop me for having a preexisting condition. If don't get the 
test, I don't know what illness is growing within me, and I don't know 
what to do. I said, You know what? I'll make a personal pledge to do 
everything I can do to make sure that there's answers for you and your 
family, and that's my promise to you. And I shook hands with her that 
moment, and I'm down here on this floor today telling her story.
  And I yield to the gentlelady from Illinois.
  Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. You know, women are really discriminated in health 
insurance. The average woman, 40 years old, pays about 48 percent more 
for health insurance. And our committee did some research, in the 
Energy and Commerce Committee Oversight and Investigation Subcommittee, 
and we found that a 21-year-old woman was paying 143 percent more, 
healthy woman, than a healthy young man of the same age, 21 years old.
  I think the worst story I have heard so far is a young woman--it has 
to do with reproductive--it has to do with what it is to be a woman, 
and we're discriminated against. And this woman went in and had a--had 
to have a cesarean section for her baby. Her insurance company told her 
that if she wanted to maintain her coverage after the cesarean section, 
she would need to be sterilized. I kid you not. People I've told that 
to gasp. We have the woman. We can, you know, present her. She's a real 
living person to whom that happened.
  And then, a couple of men who were testifying before our committee, 
both of them were recommended to get a divorce from their wives so that 
the wives could go on Medicaid and, therefore, they would get the 
health care that their--one, a hemophiliac child, and another who had 
needed a liver transplant. That was the answer that they were given. 
Get a divorce, and then your wife may, and child may be eligible for 
Medicaid.
  What is going on in the United States of America when one woman is 
told to get sterilized and two couples are told to get a divorce? The 
choices, the options are wrong. We need a public option, a robust 
public option that gives people a choice of a plan that competes with 
the insurance industry that has brought us to this time of crisis right 
now. It has to stop.

                              {time}  2100

  It's only going to get worse if we don't pass legislation that gives 
people a real choice, real competition and start to bring some sanity 
to our non-system of health care in this country.
  Mr. ELLISON. Let's kick it to the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. 
Polis).
  Mr. POLIS. People wonder why there's such passion with this issue 
created on both sides of the aisle. It's because this issue is an issue 
of life and an issue of death.
  One of my constituents from Boulder, Colorado, asked her name not be 
used for her very personal story but wanted me to share it with the 
people of the country and my colleagues in Congress.
  She tells us that she doesn't even consider her story unusual. Her 
sister was 62 and hadn't been able to afford health care for most of 
her life even though she worked as a legal secretary.
  Sixty years ago, her son, the niece of my constituent from Colorado, 
became very depressed at age 24. He was a part-time student, he didn't 
have access to any health care, let alone the mental care he so 
desperately needed. And 60 years ago on the night of July 4, he went to 
a park and shot and killed himself. The devastation to her sister and 
their entire family, as any of us know, is beyond words, beyond 
explanation.
  ``Isn't my nephew as important as any politician or rich person in 
this country?'' And that could be a question that any of us asks. She 
writes that health care is a right for all citizens, and there must be 
a robust public option. This could be any American family.
  We're talking about lives like the life of this young man with mental 
health parity, with access to mental health service. He first of all 
could have been on his parents' plan up to age 26 under our plan. If he 
wasn't able to participate in the parents' plan, he would of gotten 
affordability credits for his own plan to get insurance through the 
exchange, including a public option.
  How many lives must senselessly end like this before Congress acts? 
It's stories like this that continue to multiply; and until Congress 
takes action, we're going to have more unnecessary deaths. And that's 
why people get so passionate about this issue. We're talking about life 
and death; we're talking about people from across the entire country 
and what health care reform really means to them and their loved ones 
and their security.
  Mr. ELLISON. Let me thank the gentleman again.
  The points are powerful. As you mentioned, the robust public option, 
I have to mention that the question emerges, Who wants a public option? 
Who wants it? Doctors want it. About 63 percent of all doctors say that 
they want a health care reform plan that includes both a public and 
private option. There's another 10 percent of doctors who say they want 
a public option only. They just want a single-payer like I want. And so 
that is a full two-thirds.
  So doctors want it; two-thirds of doctors want it. Nurses want it. 
They're on record. Nurses want a public option health care reform. 
Congress wants it. Congress wants it, and we're going to show that and 
not too long from now. Faith communities have come forward and said, We 
want a public option. The President has publicly stated he prefers a 
public option. He's made this very clear. He's on record. Go out and 
Google it. And the American people want it, too.
  The most recent poll showed 57 percent of Americans want a public 
option. It has been up there in the 60s, in the high 50s. We want a 
public option. We have to fight hard to get it. It won't be easy, but 
we're going to do it.
  Let me just say this: a young man tells me he wants to know measures 
to encourage more medical students to enter primary care, what can we 
do about that and health care reform; and he also had some views that 
he wanted to express about tort reform.
  But can I just ask you guys, either one of you would be interested in 
taking on this one. What about encouraging medical students to do 
primary care? Is that an important part of health care reform in your 
view?
  Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Absolutely. I think our legislation is going to 
create incentives for medical students to go into primary care, not 
necessarily a specialty, and to make sure that we help them afford 
their medical education, which is so important. Young people going 
through medical school can end up with tens of thousands of dollars' 
worth of debt. We want to make sure that it's affordable for young 
people to go into health care.
  And the reason that primary care is so important is then we have the 
opportunity to keep our people healthy. We can take care of all of 
those things before they become sort of a crisis that's going to need 
some sort of surgery or some sort of dramatic or long-

[[Page 25556]]

term care. So that is built into the legislation. And, in fact, I am 
going to be speaking to some medical students this weekend who are very 
much supportive of our legislation because they know that it will give 
them an opportunity to go into primary care and be able to make a 
living and do what our country needs.
  Mr. ELLISON. Let me offer a few other thoughts, that is, as we are 
embarking on this effort, we're on the House floor tonight--Progressive 
Caucus comes week after week. We've been talking about health care 
since summertime. We're going to have to get another topic but not 
until we get health care reform.
  But I just want to take a moment to say this is an opportunity to 
talk about what real people are going through.
  I want to tell folks about Courtney. She's 31 and a mother of a 
toddler. In college, she was diagnosed with Crohn's disease, a 
debilitating and chronic digestive illness, serious illness. If you 
have any experience with Crohn's disease, you know it's tough.
  To control her disease, Courtney needed expensive medication, about 
$1,500 worth of shots four times a month. After first approving the 
treatment, her health care provider, United Health Care, denied 
Courtney coverage of the medication 12 months later saying that the 
shots were no longer medically necessary.
  Courtney and her doctor fought the insurer; and by January of 2009, 
the company reinstated coverage of the medication, but it was too late. 
Courtney's condition had already deteriorated, and she was in chronic 
pain with decreasing energy and quality of life. In May, she underwent 
major surgery, spending a week in the hospital and missing almost 2 
months of work.
  I yield to the gentleman from Colorado.
  Mr. POLIS. Thank you. I thank the gentleman from Minnesota.
  You alluded to other topics.
  I want to take this opportunity to remind our viewers that for the 
cost of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, not only could we cover every 
American with health care, but we would reduce the deficit by hundreds 
of billions of dollars over 10 years. And I know that that is a topic 
that many of us plan to return to as well.
  But I would point out, to put things in perspective, there were those 
on the other side of the aisle that didn't ask, didn't worry how much 
it would cost to invade and occupy not one, two countries; didn't ask 
how long it might cost to be there 10 years, 20 years, how much to 
increase it 40,000 troops, 60,000 troops, 80,000 troops.
  But there's a new-found commitment of fiscal responsibility when it 
comes to health care. And I am proud to say that the Democratic plan 
fully pays for health care reform. Not only will it fully pay for 
health care reform, but it will reduce the budget deficit over 10 years 
and help rein in growing health care costs.
  I think it's important to put a human face on what health care reform 
means for American families.
  I want to share with my colleagues in the House the story of Deborah 
Abbott Brown from Boulder, Colorado. Deborah, like a lot of Americans, 
lost her job about a year ago in the recession so she was faced with 
COBRA payments. Her COBRA payments would have been $1,800 a month to 
continue the health care for her family. She couldn't afford that. That 
was more than her mortgage payment, and at the same time she was losing 
her income. How could she afford $1,800 a month in COBRA payments?
  So she wanted to turn to--being responsible and wanting to keep her 
family with some kind of insurance--she turned to the individual 
insurance market in Colorado to try to find affordable coverage. She 
thought, You know, I'm willing to pay a reasonable amount and maybe 
we'll have some kind of high deductible or catastrophic plan. But she 
soon found out that her family was denied coverage on the individual 
market even though one of the companies she applied for was the same 
provider of the COBRA care that she couldn't afford.
  The reason is that her husband, Deborah's husband, had recently 
turned 50, completed his baseline colonoscopy, as was recommended by 
his physician, and was told that the procedure counted as a surgery and 
in the individual market they would not offer insurance to anybody who 
had a surgical procedure in the last 3 months. Deborah was shocked. How 
can a common medical procedure when there were no findings be the basis 
for denying coverage?
  That's when it dawned on Deborah, as it dawning on millions of 
Americans every day, that insurance companies work for their own 
profit. They unreasonably deny insurance in the individual market when 
they don't provide needed insurance profits. That's when Deborah became 
a convert and told us that's why the public option is a must.
  This is a routine occurrence. Families across our country--
California, Illinois, Minnesota, Texas--they want to do the right 
thing. She wanted to get COBRA, but for $1,800 a month, she said let's 
find an affordable option. Oh, your husband had a routine preventative 
procedure that he should have had--and it was a good thing he had from 
a medical perspective--came out clean but, oh, he had a surgery in the 
last 3 months.
  This is what American families are being told, and this is where we 
in Congress have a historic opportunity to fix and make a health care 
system that's good for American families.
  I yield back.
  Mr. ELLISON. Before I yield to the gentlewoman from Illinois, I've 
got a story here.
  A 50-year-old woman with Morton's neuroma. Surgery was scheduled, but 
she was laid off and lost her insurance. Now she can barely walk, and 
she can't get to surgery.
  So I yield to the gentlelady again.
  Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. At this point, I just want to thank Mr. Ellison, the 
gentleman from Minnesota, for coming down to the floor and helping to 
educate our Members of Congress and whoever may be watching about the 
dilemma that we face right now and how Congress can fix it, that we can 
gather all of these stories that we've been telling tonight and then 
work out a plan that actually addresses them. And if we don't take this 
opportunity to lift the burden of fear, of distress, and sometimes even 
death from American families, then shame on us.
  It is time to act. We have a plan that can fix this problem. And we 
have just a few more weeks. We've got to do it before the end of this 
year.
  And I just want to thank the gentlemen from Minnesota and from 
Colorado for contributing to the solution to these problems.
  I yield back.
  Mr. ELLISON. I thank the gentlelady for yielding.
  I just want to point out this. Because you know, let's just face it, 
we all want bipartisanship. I want it. My dad's a Republican, and I 
love my dad, and my brother is, too, and I love him; and we debate, you 
know, tax policy and all of this kind of stuff. And we have a good time 
over dinner time whenever I can be in Detroit.
  But the point is when it comes down to the basic necessities of life 
like health care, why can't we all come together on this thing? Why 
can't we say that, you know what, in the richest country not only in 
the world but in the history of the world, that 49 million people 
shouldn't be left in the cold and we shouldn't have people who have 
employer-based health care facing doubling of premiums every 10 years. 
We shouldn't have people being dropped and rescinding everything else 
for preexisting conditions.
  Let us have our values and form our behavior. We have a historic 
opportunity right here in front of us.
  Because we are running out of time--the gentlelady from Texas has 
just joined us--we're going to give her an opportunity to share her 
experience on this tremendous fight that we're in right now.
  I yield to the gentlelady from Texas, Ms. Sheila Jackson-Lee.
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. I thank the gentleman from Minnesota for 
his kindness.
  It is typical what Members say. We could not avoid coming here to 
this

[[Page 25557]]

floor because of the enormity of the power of what you are presenting 
to the American public and our colleagues.
  I am pleased to be with my colleague from Illinois and my colleague 
from Colorado. It indicates how widespread and how diverse the need for 
a public option, a vigorous public option, and health care reform 
actually is.
  We're from many different areas. All of us have nuances to the needs 
for health care reform. Many of us have different hospital issues. But 
we have been working on this now for almost a year, and what I like 
about what I heard on the floor today is I heard Members saying that we 
now are at the hour of no return.

                              {time}  2115

  We're at Martin Luther King's, ``If not now, then when?''
  As I listen to a number of colleagues speaking about the lack of 
health care reform or health insurance--there are many numbers--I hear 
18,000 people die every year without health insurance and because they 
don't have health insurance, and those numbers are mounting. I hear as 
well that there are people with breast cancer who are trying to get 
insurance, but they have a preexisting disease, and that is called 
acne.
  We heard of the tragic story, which happened about 7 years ago or 
about 5 or so years ago, of the leukemia victim, of the 8-year old, who 
literally had her parents take her to the insurance company's office in 
California and beg for the opportunity to have a bone marrow 
transplant, which they repeatedly denied over and over again. 
Tragically, that little girl lost her life.
  So I just want to say to my colleagues that a vigorous public option 
is about lower premiums, saved dollars and saved lives, and I believe 
that now is the time.
  To my dear friend, as you well know, you will be joining us in a very 
special hearing on Tuesday, October 27, in room 2141, when Members will 
open themselves up to hearing from those patients, or from those 
Americans, who will come to this Hill.
  There will be no tickets. We will not bar you from coming to give 
witness to health crises that you've experienced alone and without help 
because you had no health insurance. A number of us will be hosting 
this hearing where we will listen to patients and doctors. We open it 
up, and we ask that you come to the Rayburn room--to the Judiciary 
Committee room--which is 2141, Rayburn, on Tuesday, October 27, with 
Jackson-Lee, Conyers, Ellison, Johnson, Barbara Lee, Kucinich, Clarke, 
Woolsey, and many others.
  I'm going to yield to the gentleman by simply saying this: When you 
think of health care, let us not selfishly think of the people who, in 
essence, have their own. Maybe they have employer-based insurance. Just 
look beyond. Look at your working neighbor. I would imagine that two 
houses on your block or more are without health care insurance. That is 
what we will be addressing on Tuesday, and that is what we will be 
doing when we take this vote as we go into this period of time of no 
return to vote for a health care bill that helps those who have helped 
America--a vigorous public option and, as well, health care reform that 
addresses the question of America's needs.
  I yield back to the gentleman, and I thank him for his kindness.
  Mr. ELLISON. Let me thank the gentlewoman from Texas. It was great to 
get her in at the end of this Progressive hour.
  I just want to say that I just got a message which says, I'm a health 
care worker who continues to see people come into the hospital who are 
sicker than they should be due to no insurance.
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Wow.
  Mr. ELLISON. With that, I think the gentleman from Colorado is 
probably going to have the last word, but I just want to say this has 
been the Progressive hour. We come here week after week to talk about 
progressive values that make America better and stronger, and we're 
going to continue to do that.
  So I yield to the gentleman, and I think you'll probably take us out.
  Mr. POLIS. I thank the gentleman from Minnesota, and I thank you for 
your ongoing leadership and for fighting for working families and for 
fighting to make America stronger.
  You know, there are a lot of slogans that are tossed out. What's in 
this bill, if you look at it, is not the government takeover of health 
care. There are not government-employed doctors or government-run 
hospitals. There are no death panels. Who would support that? I 
wouldn't support that.
  Would you, Ms. Jackson-Lee?
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Absolutely not. Absolutely not.
  Mr. POLIS. No. Who the heck would support it?
  So what we're talking about supporting is making health care more 
affordable for American families. That's what we're talking about doing 
here.
  I yield back.
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. And protecting seniors.
  Mr. ELLISON. We might have about 10 more seconds, but I just want to 
say this has been the Progressive hour. I am so honored to appear with 
you great Members, with you great servants of the people.
  I believe we're going to get a public insurance health care option 
with major health care reform. The time is now. Let's not back down.
  We yield back.

                          ____________________