White Coats at the White House, Thursday, March 5

UPDATE, March 5: Thanks to your calls and emails, the White House invited Rep. John Conyers and Dr. Oliver Fein, president of Physicians for a National Health Plan! So no need to demonstrate, at least today!

We've asked our D.C. area members to join this demo tomorrow, with their white coats, scrubs & stethoscopes, if appropriate!

White Coats to The White House
Thursday, March 5, 12 to 1 p.m., Lafayette Park, Washington, D.C.

President Obama is holding a Healthcare Summit on Thursday, March 5th, which is expected to draw more than 120 individuals, including representatives from Americas Health Insurance Plans, the largest group of private health insurance lobbyists--but no advocates for single payer healthcare, the plan favored by a majority of Americans.

Please join Physicians for a National Health Program and other members of the Leadership Conference for Guaranteed Health Care, the National Single Payer Alliance, for a demonstration at Lafayette Square, in front of the White House, Thursday, March 5th from noon to 1:00 pm. For more information contact Danielle Alexander, (202) 662-0614, danielle@pnhp.org

If you're not able to attend, please spread the word among friends, family and neighbors!

"It appears that despite the fact that a majority of Americans and American physicians support a single payer -- an improved Medicare for All -- as the best solution to our nation's health care crisis, they will have no voice at this Thursday's summit," said Dr. Quentin Young, national coordinator of Physicians for a National Health Program.

Single payer - which would create a health care system based on public financing of privately delivered care much like that seen in other industrialized nations - is the health reform with support from 60% of the American public (Gallup Poll, 2007) and the majority of American physicians (Annals of Internal Medicine, 2008). Single payer would usher improved health and affordable health care to all Americans.

Single payer national health care is the only model proven to lead us out of a seemingly perpetual health care crisis. "In years past, President Obama endorsed single payer as the best solution to the crisis," Young said. "Today it appears that this option will not even get a hearing at the summit. We believe this exclusion compromises, profoundly, the possibility of a popular, effective solution to our No. 1 domestic problem. This is a colossal blunder."