Many feel the health care market is broken, and the Oregon Student Public Interest Research Group is prescribing a healthy dose of cost reduction, increased access, quality improvement and increased funding.
Since the beginning of winter term, University OSPIRG members have been campaigning for a better state health care system and gathering a coalition of students who want to see reform.
“All the OSPIRG students basically got together and said, ‘We need to do something about this now,’” said the group’s campus organizer, Colleen Kimball.
During the past 10 weeks, hundreds of students have shown their support for the campaign. The group hosted a screening of “Sicko”, Michael Moore’s film criticizing the state of health care in the U.S. today. Last Friday, other students joined them in a march protesting the Western Oregon Plan Revisions.

OSPIRG’s ultimate goal is to present their health care plans and ideas to the seven-member Oregon Health Fund Board appointed by Gov. Ted Kulongoski last September. This spring, the board will present a reformed health plan to Kulongoski, and the final plan may become a bill in the 2009 legislative session. But according to Laura Etherton, who sits on the board’s finance committee, the bill “won’t pass unless it has the backing of the public. It’s really important for students and consumers to have folks advocating for the public at the table.”
That’s why Nathaniel Cekay, OSPIRG’s health care campaign leader, plans to attend “as many of these health fund board meetings as possible” to give students a voice in the matter.
“We’ve heard many health care horror stories since we’ve been campaigning, which shows it directly impacts students’ lives,” Cekay said.
The group’s main goal is to show the Board that health care isn’t all about finances and politicians – there’s also a personal element.
“All they’re seeing is the suits, the lobbyists, the numbers,” Kimball said. “The whole point of this campaign is to personalize this problem.”
Cekay said, “Health care cannot be economically driven in the same manner as other businesses are driven. It directly affects everyone.”
OSPIRG members believe the root of the problem is in the market. In a typical capitalist market, consumers choose the product they want based on a combination of price and quality. However, when it comes to health care, most people don’t have the expertise to choose the right product for themselves, so it’s up to the doctors – which OSPIRG feels leaves hospitals and prescription drug companies free to raise prices on their products.
As a result, insurance premiums are rising faster than inflation along with out-of-pocket costs like copays, deductibles and coinsurance, leaving more and more people unable to pay for the health care they need.
Cekay cited an example of two friends of his who “have a child who has been suffering from ear infections. One is a student and the other works, and they’re only able to afford the bare minimum for health care. The parents can’t afford to take the child to a regular doctor, so they’ve had to take the child to a crisis emergency center. A lot of the employees are fed up that they keep coming there, but they can’t do anything about it.”
OSPIRG may already have the support of some Democrats. U.S. Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore. showed support for health care reform when he and Ways and Means Health Subcommittee Chairman Pete Stark (D-Calif.) introduced the Physician Payment Sunshine Act on Mar. 13, which would require prescription drug companies to publicly report any gifts with a value of $25 or more given to doctors in connection with marketing activities.
“Americans are being gouged by pharmaceutical companies that spend more on marketing than they do on research and development,” DeFazio said in a Wednesday news release. “This bill will keep the pharmaceutical industry honest.”
Cekay believes the health care crisis could change if everyone – not just consumers and employers, but also doctors, insurance companies, hospitals and drug companies – paid for Oregonians’ health care based on what they could afford.
Kimball stressed that the campaign’s goal is not just aimed at helping people who don’t have health care. “We want to make it affordable, accessible and better for everyone,” she said.
Etherton has hope that OSPIRG and the rest of Oregon consumers will sway legislators.
“Everyone knows that the current health care system is not working,” Etherton said. “It’s time to rein in the costs and make it affordable for everyone.”
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