Single-payer’s time has come

Health-insurance companies are parasites. Most people understand this, and so do Speaker of the Assembly Anthony Rendon and Assemblymember Dr. Joaquin Arambula.

Which begs the question: Why has Rendon shelved the Healthy California Act, a single-payer bill which excludes insurance companies, and why have Arambula and a handful of others allowed themselves to be bullied by Rendon into going along with obstruction of this legislation?

The good news is that the actions of these legislators present only a temporary setback to single-payer health care, because it is going to happen eventually. When it does, Californians will find themselves relieved of the burden of premiums, co-pays, deductibles, and denials of care.

They will pay for health care in vastly less burdensome ways and without 20-30 percent of their health care dollars going to insurance-generated overhead. Then they will be asking, “Why didn’t we do this sooner?”

Meanwhile, let's not be fooled by the sham “select committee” hearings coming up. Those will be geared to keeping insurance companies in the picture, with single-payer left unmentioned.

Rendon, Arambula, and others in the Legislature, do the right thing and stop this shameful delay! Single-payer's time has come.

This story was originally published September 20, 2017 at 1:52 AM with the headline "Single-payer’s time has come."