Editor’s note: This commentary is by Walter Carpenter, a writer who lives in Montpelier and who has been active in the health care reform movement for many years after a severe medical crisis put him up against the private insurance industry.
Although the governor put single-payer on hold, this does not mean Vermont cannot move toward this goal in other ways.
The misnamed Affordable Care Act cannot, and will not, provide universal care. Perhaps a more appropriate nomenclature for the ACA (or Obamacare, as it is known) would be the analogy given to it by Wendell Potter, former head of corporate communications at Cigna health insurance company. It is, as he said, “The Insurance Industry Profit Protection and Enhancement Act (Potter, Wendell, Elimination of Public Option Threw Consumers to the Insurance Wolves, The Center for Public Integrity, February 16, 2015).” As Mr. Potter noted, the ACA’s main beneficiary is the private sector…..continue to site for the rest of the article