Long-time HCFA-WA supporter and recently retired RN Cris Currie explains the disingenuous origins of the term "consumer-driven" to describe plans that, in fact, only shift more of the costs to the individual while further limiting coverage.

Much of what happens to hurt poor people happens in state capitols, not in the Congress. Healthcare is blocked in state capitols. Voting laws are written in state capitols. Denial of living wages happens in state capitols. Cutting money from public education happens in both federal and state, but so much of it happens at the state level -- Reverend Dr. William Barber

Join Advocates at the 2018 Healthcare-NOW! Single Payer Strategy Conference
June 22-24 - Minneapolis

Long-time HCFA-WA supporter and recently retired RN Cris Currie, who spent the last 13 years of his career in home health serving mostly Medicare and Medicaid patients, explains a common refrain: healthcare is a right.

Long-time HCFA-WA supporter and recently retired RN Cris Currie, who spent the last 13 years of his career in home health serving mostly Medicare and Medicaid patients, breaks down the 2017 Pew Research Center poll's findings that 60% of Americans believe it's the federal government’s responsibility to ensure Americans have healthcare. 

Long-time HCFA-WA supporter and recently retired RN Cris Currie, who spent the last 13 years of his career in home health serving mostly Medicare and Medicaid patients, addresses a common objection to universal/single payer healthcare: Centralization would leave us worse off than the status quo and take away choice.  

School Bus Drivers in Seattle are on strike for health care. It’s a no brainer: if we had single payer in our state, there would be no need to strike over health care coverage. The School Bus Drivers would be able to get the health care they need for themselves and their families. What would it mean if we could take health care off the bargaining table? Call First Student Bus Company at (206) 763-2222 and let them know unaffordable healthcare coverage is as good as having no healthcare coverage at all.

On January 16, HCFA-WA took to the Capitol steps in support of single payer healthcare. Senator David Frockt introduced our bill, SB5701, to the Senate Health and Long Term Care Committee, and many people offered testimony in support of a single payer system. Attendees who signed in for the hearing were 59 pro, 4 against.

"Healthcare would be privately delivered but publicly financed through the Washington Health Security Trust...health professionals and patients would make the medical decisions, not an insurance company." 

In response to the recent school-bus driver's strike in Seattle, our Outreach Committee co-chair Ruth Knagenhjelm wrote to the Seattle Times to offer a complete solution: universal healthcare. The entirety of her letter is below.