Latest / The Health Care for All Podcast / EP1: Introducing The Health Care for All Podcast
Transcript
- Collin Stackhouse: the case for universal healthcare is very simple at its core. It saves lives and it saves money. Every country with a universal healthcare system is healthier than the US and spends less. And that's not just my opinion, that is real data. And we're gonna dig into all of that. Welcome to the Health Care For All Podcast. I am Collin Stackhouse. Rebecca Schoon: And I'm Rebecca Schoon. ⁓ And perhaps you've heard, Oregon is on track to be the first state to win universal healthcare in the United States. Collin Stackhouse: Did that get your attention? ⁓ Rebecca just said that Oregon could be the first state to move to universal healthcare. That is the point of this podcast. Rebecca Schoon: So whoever's out there listening, we are so glad you're here because what's happening in Oregon right now in healthcare is literally historic. My Italian side of the family is pretty guilty of indulgent exaggerations, but but this is legit, everybody. Collin Stackhouse: We're here talking about Oregon's path to potentially become the first state in the country to transition to universal healthcare. ⁓ The ball is already in motion. and this could be decided in the next year or two or three. So we are starting this Health Care For All Podcast to make sure that you are informed about what is happening and learn about the ways that you can get involved to help us make this happen. Rebecca Schoon: So in this first episode, we're gonna share a brief rundown of what we hope to do on this podcast, how we hope it'll serve you, why we started it, ⁓ and why you should care. whether you're living in Oregon or not Collin Stackhouse: So tell me Rebecca, why are we spending our time together working on this podcast? Rebecca Schoon: So I'm a professor of public health, as you know, I was designing a course on universal healthcare. But when I went to look for materials that I could share with my students to help them understand universal healthcare, I basically came up empty. A lot of the material was really technical, written for health policy experts, or it was so simplified, it actually left a lot of room for misunderstandings. And I think also left a lot of room for people's really important questions to go unanswered. Collin Stackhouse: So Rebecca brought this frustration to the rest of us at Health Care For All Oregon, which is the nonprofit that we're both a part of. And it turned out that quite a few of us had been thinking the exact same thing, which was that we all needed to start a podcast. We needed to create the resource that we wished existed out in the world. Rebecca Schoon: So what is this podcast designed to do? A few things. Number one, help you understand what universal healthcare really is and what it isn't. ⁓ Number two, give you the tools to cut through all the myths, the misinformation that is rampant out there. Collin Stackhouse: And number three, potentially the most important, we wanna keep you up to date on exactly where Oregon is in this journey in real time. We are not watching from the sidelines. Oregon is in the middle of the game, in the middle of the movie, in the middle of the marathon right now, today, and we want you in on the action too. Rebecca Schoon: Yes, we're going to highlight specific ways that you can get involved to help us win ⁓ universal healthcare in Oregon, because we do need your help. I always say that's the number one factor that's going to decide if we win this whether enough Oregonians get involved to demand So now's the perfect time to join in. Collin Stackhouse: So, who are we? As she mentioned, Dr. Rebecca Schoon is a professor of public health at Pacific University in Forest Grove here in Oregon. Rebecca has been a long time advocate for universal healthcare reform and is a member of the Health Care for All Oregon Board of Directors, helping to guide our nonprofits work over the last six years. Rebecca Schoon: And Collin Stackhouse is our communications coordinator at HCAO. He's been with us as a staff member for a little over a year, but Collin came in just as a volunteer. He revamped and expanded our social media presence. He's had great success with videos that have gone viral on Instagram and TikTok in the last year. ⁓ And Collin was also selected to serve on the Community Engagement and Communications Subcommittee of the Universal Health Plan Governance Board. Now this is the group who is designing the proposed universal healthcare plan for Oregon. We're going to explain all of that in a minute. Collin Stackhouse: We should also tell you what Health Care for All Oregon is. ⁓ HCAO is a 501C3 nonprofit. We don't deliver healthcare and we are not an insurance company. We are not the Oregon Health Plan, which is Oregon's version of Medicaid. We are also not Care Oregon, which is Oregon's largest CCO or coordinated care organization. Our organization, Health Care for All Oregon, ⁓ HCAO, advocates and educates for universal healthcare reform at the state level and specifically in Oregon. And we are hopeful that our state can act as the first domino leading this to scale nationally for something like Medicare for All for every state. Rebecca Schoon: And this podcast is not going to be just us as two talking heads. We're going to bring in policy experts, physicians and other health care workers, ⁓ advocates who engage in the daily work to win an initiative as big as this. Collin Stackhouse: We'll also be talking to people who live in countries with universal healthcare systems so we can hear what it's really like to get care from within these systems. Rebecca Schoon: So let's take a minute to talk about this moment that we're currently in. You've probably heard about Medicare for All at the national level. Most health policy analysts agree that winning universal healthcare at the national level would be pretty difficult in the near future. I don't want to say impossible. There have been polls that have shown a lot of shifts in this favor. We have incredible advocates working for Medicare for All at but Washington is also gridlocked, to put it lightly. ⁓ So we'd love to see national Medicare for All, but at HCAO and many health policy analysts agree, we believe that in this current climate, national reform is difficult Collin Stackhouse: And believe it or not, Oregon has the best chance of any of the 50 states to make this move first. Rebecca Schoon: And states have often been innovative test ground for social policies before going national, like social security. And that's actually how Canada got national health insurance. One province, Saskatchewan, adopted it first, And eventually it went national. here in the US, Oregon is currently out in front on this issue. Collin Stackhouse: Yep, and our organization, Health Care for All Oregon, has been working for 25 years to get us to where we are today. One of the most recent successes in this effort was in 2023, when we helped pass a state Senate bill creating the current Universal Health Plan Governance Board. Rebecca Schoon: Yes, and again, we're gonna be referring to this board a lot on this podcast. Collin Stackhouse: And we want to get ahead of some confusion. This governance board is not a part of HCAO. ⁓ HCAO has a board of directors, just like any nonprofit, and Rebecca is on our board of directors. But this Universal Health Plan Governance Board was created by Oregon's legislature and our governor appointed its members. Rebecca Schoon: The governance board is made up of nine appointees, all of whom have a really deep expertise in Oregon's healthcare landscape. ⁓ And it's their job to design a plan for how Oregon could transition to universal healthcare. So this plan, which will include how it's funded, what it covers, how it's going to work is due to be delivered to the Oregon State Legislature ⁓ this December 2026. Collin Stackhouse: So soon. Exciting and very nerve-racking. Rebecca Schoon: Yes, we have a lot to do before then. Collin Stackhouse: So in the 2027 legislative session, the Oregon legislature will discuss implementing universal healthcare in our state. They will have a couple options. They could vote to implement universal healthcare during that 2027 session, or they could refer it to voters, in which case we'll likely see this on our ballot in 2028. So there are a few possible pathways, but this timeline is real and this is happening as we speak. Rebecca Schoon: Also we should mention that the governance board has several subcommittees, one of which Collin serves on, as I mentioned in his intro. intro. We are going to invite members of the governance board and its subcommittees onto the podcast to share updates on the progress of the actual plan. For now, we'll share that the model that is likely being proposed is like a single payer system. We'll go into what that is in greater detail in a future episode. But for now, you can think of it as one public health insurance company that covers every resident in the state. So there's one entity that pays all providers. It sounds simple. And you're right, it is simple. That is one of its main advantages. Our current system is like a Frankenstein mess with mismatched parts. These parts were never built to work together efficiently, and profits are being siphoned off at every one of these junctures. Single payer solves that. It creates a streamlined, efficient payment system that gets rid of the profit motive. And that simplicity is one of the reasons why it saves so much money. Collin Stackhouse: Yet the path to get there is not so simple, so we're gonna walk you through every step. And this is the thing that I keep coming back to when I talk to Rebecca and anybody else about this, which is that the case for universal healthcare is very simple at its core. It saves lives and it saves money. Every country with a universal healthcare system is healthier than the US and spends less. And that's not just my opinion, that is real data. And we're gonna dig into all of that. So what can you expect from this podcast going forward? We're planning to release episodes weekly or bi-weekly, and we'll have a few recurring formats. Rebecca Schoon: So we're going to have our Universal Health Care 101 series that's going to cover the fundamentals. What is universal healthcare? What are the different models? How has it worked in other countries? Collin Stackhouse: We'll also do some deeper dives into the governance board, the legislative process in Oregon and at the federal level, what's happening in some of the other states that are working towards the same goal. Oregon is not alone in this and reform efforts are gaining steam all across the USA. Rebecca Schoon: And I cannot wait for our myth-busting series. There's so much misinformation out there. ⁓ I personally am guilty of wasting too much of my time deep in social media threads, slaying misinformation dragons. So I hope this podcast will be a much more efficient way to arm the public with real facts on this issue. Collin Stackhouse: And that's the thing about sharing facts on social media. Once you share enough facts, it changes people's minds. It's a guarantee. ⁓ We want to hear from you. What have you heard about universal healthcare that you're not sure is true? What are your hopes and what are your concerns? We really want this podcast to be listener led and an opportunity for you to feel informed about the choices Oregon will be making in its very near future. You'll be able to submit questions and requests right on our website and we'll do several Ask Us Anything episodes to answer that. Rebecca Schoon: Yeah, I'm excited for this. And we hope that you all get excited too by what is literally a chance to help make history. This is a huge lift. But again, the one variable I think that will determine whether we win this is whether enough Oregonians get involved to make it happen. So. as noted, we'll highlight different ways to get involved in future episodes. But actually, ⁓ You You can go to HCAO's website right now at hcao.org, ⁓ hcao.org, and fill out a volunteer form. Collin Stackhouse: Another step, one of our top recommendations is to sign up for an HCAO 101 class. It's a live online session that introduces new volunteers to our work, a little bit of the history, and it connects you with ways to get involved. And you can find that link also on our website. Rebecca Schoon: And if you're already sold on the importance of the issue, sold on the work it will take to make it a reality, we would love for you to support HCAO's work financially. There's a donate button on our website too. We are a bare bones, super lean organization. I am amazed at what our movement has accomplished to date, but my God, there is so much more work we could do and frankly that we need to do to pull this off. And it's just a basic truth that we need funds to do that. So if this is a passion of yours, do not sleep on that donate button. We'll include that link in the show notes. Collin Stackhouse: Oregonians have an opportunity to be part of something that will be written about in history books. I don't know if you've heard the saying, don't let a good crisis go to waste. The profit-driven crisis in our healthcare system is very much here, ⁓ and it's hurting so many people. It's hurting me, people I care about, people I love, my friends and my neighbors. Let's put this terrible crisis to work. to get a healthcare system that fulfills its purpose to help people who need care, not the shareholders and not the insurance company executives. Rebecca Schoon: That's it. That's the goal, Collin. And everybody listening, I can't wait to dig into all of this with you. So thank you so much for listening to this first teaser episode of the Health Care for All Podcast, and we hope to see you at the next one.