By Dorothy Rowley
AFRO Staff Writer
Congresswomen Donna M. Christensen (D. V.I.) and Barbara Jackson Lee (D. TX) converse during recent Civil Rights War Room meeting with NAACP Washington Bureau chief Hilary Shelton. (Photo courtesy of NAACP)
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(November 8, 2009) - In an effort to coordinate lobbying efforts on health care, the NAACP on Nov. 5 joined forces with the National Urban League, Black Leadership Forum and several other high profile activist groups to unveil a “Civil Rights Health Care War Room” located in the lobbyist hub of K Street in Washington, D.C.
During the unveiling, participating members discussed the importance of lawmakers moving toward immediate health care reformation. They cited a number of facts, including:
* Children born to Black women are more than twice as likely to die within their first year of life than children born to White women
* People of color are more likely to suffer and die from diabetes, cancer, cardiovascular disease, and other chronic diseases
* Uninsured Americans are more likely to use the Emergency Room for preventative care and routine checkups, forcing longer wait times and costing states and taxpayers more.
The “war room” will include phone banks, cross-country rallies and the mobilization of Black radio stations to marshal the votes needed among Democrats in Congress to get a public option in health care passed.
Health care reformation has become President Obama’s major domestic priority, and the president has called for a universal plan. However, another option would allow government-run insurance programs to compete with private health insurance plans.
Congresswoman Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), who attended the unveiling, said the same grassroots mobilization that helped elect Obama is needed to achieve a bill which would provide an option in health care.
“Grassroots activism will help us pass a heath care reform with a strong public option,” said Lee, “[as well as] a health care bill that will cover the uninsured and reduce costs of those who have insurance.”
She said that groups mobilized for reform need to find a way to ensure that America changes its policy to hold that health care is a basic civil right, and not a privilege.
NAACP President Ben Jealous said that, if the country had been able to have real health care reform in the 1990s, then 880,000 more Black Americans might be alive today.
“But [that] didn’t happen,” Jealous said. “They died because they couldn’t get the health care that they needed. And the impact is real. People die, children die. Black children are twice as likely to die before their first birthday [and] most Black people know someone who has died for want of effective health care policy.”