Health Care Is A Human Right
- by: Ladder to Leadership Fellows Program Central New York Cohort, Access To Care Team
- recipient: Everyone.
Have you noticed? The current health care debate is about money, not people. Health care should not be a privilege, commodity or source of profit.
Help us change the dialogue. Invite your friends to join the movement to make the Right to Health Care a key part of the discussion.
Read on to learn more about this issue and view the letter (click under the logo) for our Declaration of Health Rights.On December 10, 1948 the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Article 25 of this Declaration proclaimed "Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control." For all of the advances made in the United States to ensure individual security, the right to health care and security when sick has fallen by the wayside.
Missing in past and current health reform debate dialogue is acknowledgement that all Americans have the fundamental human right to health care. The current health care system is overburdened, inefficient, expensive and often inaccessible. Many members of American communities do not have access to health care. For some, affordability, geography, cultural and ethnic disparities, or language barriers keep them from receiving health care. Many are without health insurance, and even those with coverage often cannot afford the deductibles or co-pays. For many people, there is a perceived stigma to accessing public health programs or services they are eligible for.
Lost in every prior attempt to reform and improve the health care system is the resolve and determination that all individuals have a fundamental right to affordable, accessible health care. The current health care reform debate among legislators, policy experts, and insurance and pharmaceutical companies continues to root the problem in terms of money and coverage, allowing privilege, commodity, and profit interests to completely dominate the dialogue. To effectively address this problem, a shared consensus that all Americans have a fundamental human right to health care must be the cornerstone of every community, state, and national effort to enact true health care reform.
We the undersigned, believe that all people have the right to health care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health. Health is more than the absence of disease, but includes prevention of illness, development of individual potential, and a positive sense of physical, mental and social well-being.
We believe that all people have the right to health care, regardless of age, race, ethnicity, religion, socio-economic or employment status, or geography.
We believe that all people have the right to receive appropriate and quality care when and where they need it.
We believe that health care advancements should be based on dialogue and collaboration among citizens, professionals, communities and policy makers. Health services should be affordable, accessible, effective, efficient and convenient.
We believe in the important role of personal responsibility in health care. It is important to create conditions in which people can and will make good health care choices.
We believe in proactive rather than reactive policy-making. Health care reform dialogue and policy-making needs to be framed in terms of people first, not the financial bottom line.
We as citizens concerned about access to health care and health improvement in communities, states, and the nation, do hereby commit ourselves to advocacy and action to promote the health rights of every American.
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