Pennsylvania's health-care solution is not single-payer

Molly Rush and the Pennsylvania HealthCare Solutions Coalition apparently believe that the creation of a single-payer system at the state level is the cure for our sick system of health benefits delivery ("A Viable Cure for Health-Care Costs Is Here," Oct. 31 letters). Well, I'm not smart enough to suggest what will work but I'm smart enough to recognize what won't work. Any "single-payer system" that isn't single will be a cure worse than the disease.

The only state to attempt this -- Hawaii -- had a lot of things going its way. It applied for and received a special exemption from ERISA (the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, the federal law that governs benefit delivery for all citizens) and it already had a de facto single-payer system with the dominant insurance carrier in the state. Eighty-two percent of the population of the state lives in one city and, as a collection of islands, it had a "captive audience." After years of trying to make it work, however, Hawaii abandoned the plan about 18 months ago.

Here's what's against us: It is unlikely that Pennsylvania will ever receive the ERISA exemption; we have an uneven system of health delivery (do you really think the citizens of Coudersport are getting the same health care as the citizens of Fox Chapel?); and we can't control the future delivery (are you going to tell your cardiologist he has to move to Coudersport?). We have issues Hawaii didn't even face.

As for saving that 25 percent retention cost, is Pennsylvania going to do this for free? I guess Ms. Rush thinks that Pennsylvania will do it for a lot less because of our state's ongoing reputation of doing everything so cheaply and efficiently.

There may be a future for a debate on a national single-payer system, but let's not waste our breath on something that can't work.

DENNIS A. CASEY
Vice President
Managed Care of America, Inc.
Green Tree

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For before conception

A Nov. 1 Post-Gazette article ("Easier Access to Pill for Rape Victims") reports on proposed legislation to require hospitals to provide the so-called "morning-after pill" to rape victims. The article states that the "Catholic Church permits the pill to be used by rape victims within 24 hours of sexual assault."

As a point of clarification, Catholic institutions are required to conduct appropriate tests to determine that conception has not taken place before any such medications can be given. The Catholic Church could not and would not approve of the imposition of drugs that would act as abortifacients.

Any proposed legislation should respect the fundamental right that faith-based hospitals cannot be forced to participate in contraceptive abortion procedures that violate the conscience of members of the Catholic medical community.

ROBERT P. LOCKWOOD
Director for Communications
Diocese of Pittsburgh
Downtown

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Meddling hands

The Nov. 1 letter by Diane Gramley of the American Family Association of Pennsylvania, "Take Seriously the Harm that Pornography Can Cause," would have been one of the funniest things I read all day if it wasn't serious.

Once again a so-called "family" group wants to limit access from something already age-restricted. These are the same groups that want the FCC to censor pay TV and radio services and don't think that Americans are intelligent enough to monitor what their children see without having a government nanny telling them what they can and can't see. Aren't conservatives supposed to be against government intrusion? I guess the pressure from the religious right trumps old-school conservatism.

If I was a representative for the American Library Association, I'd demand a retraction and/or an apology for making the implication that libraries want to hand out adult material to children. I don't know about anyone else, but I have never seen pornography in a public library, unless the AFA has changed the definition. Even Internet access, the 21st-century punching bag of the far right, is strictly monitored in libraries. I see these claims as nothing more than an attempt to demonize public libraries. Perhaps they're afraid someone will go to one and look up their founder, the Rev. Don Wildmon, and find some of the censorship and bigotry he's championed in the past.

The American Family Association should stick to its usual mission of being wildly homophobic in the name of Jesus rather than trying to convince people that public libraries want to pass out porno to your children. This "think of the children" strawman for censorship isn't going to hold up.

SAM DAWES
Verona

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Responsibility first

Regarding Diane Gramley's Nov. 1 letter: I'm unsure of her actual point, but am confident that her ultimate dream and goal is the complete elimination of the porn industry. What a simplistic plan that will never happen or help! All too often groups try to solve a problem by this method, instead of placing responsibility where it should actually lie: the people involved.

To address some of her points:

"An estimated 70 percent of porn ends up in the hands of children" Answer: Parents, pay attention! Take some responsibility. Just as you would lock up a gun, lock up your porn.

"The LAPD released a study showing that pornography was used in two-thirds of child molestation cases." Answer: Well, no kidding, but is that the actual porn's fault or problem? No, it is the offender that is the problem, and needs help/treatment/education. The same is true of her next comment citing "Ann Burgess, a professor of psychiatric mental health nursing at Boston College, [who] has noted that child sex abusers use pornography to lower the inhibitions of children."

I'm not a porn advocate and could personally care less about the industry. But I do care when groups such as the American Family Association keep trying to take personal responsibility out of the picture by trampling our rights as individuals and calling on the government (or some other organization) to control more and more of our lives. It weakens the nation as a whole if you turn us all into lemmings that blindly follow orders, instead of teaching everyone what is right and how to behave in a responsible society.

MICHAEL HORNER
Dormont

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Smoke and mirrors

What do Ireland, Italy, Sweden, Iran and Norway do for their citizens that we do not? These countries all have banned smoking in public places. Pennsylvania may be one of the last industrial states to protect its workers from the hazards of tobacco smoke, as reported by Tracie Mauriello in the Oct. 30 Post-Gazette ("Lights Out?").

The case for restricting smoking in public places is not merely based on the broad array of positive health impacts that Dr. Ronald Herberman noted in that story and in his Oct. 23 Business commentary ("Bans on Public Smoking Protect Health, Economy"). It also rests on firm evidence that businesses and health insurers will benefit economically from such a ban. More and more national organizations are refusing to hold meetings in locales that permit smoking in public. National organizations of restaurants and hotels are calling for bans on smoking in public places. The Nov. 1 USA Today reported that Washington state is even considering the first statewide ban on smoking within 25 feet of buildings that prohibit smoking.

The Pennsylvania Legislature should act soon to see that we do not lose our ability to attract national meetings to the city because of antiquated policies on smoking. We should protect the health of the majority of our citizens who do not smoke and do not wish to be in environments where they are forced to breathe health-damaging fumes produced by others.

DEVRA L. DAVIS
Director Center for Environmental Oncology
UPMC
Oakland

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Pretzel logic

Indictments were issued Oct. 28 in the CIA leak investigation, and it appears that Lewis "Scooter" Libby has been accused of having lied about not having committed a crime that wasn't committed and wasn't a crime.

Got that? No? Well, then let me repeat it. Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald has accused Mr. Libby of having lied about not having committed a crime that wasn't committed and wasn't a crime.

If you're having trouble following that pretzel logic, congratulations, you're a sane, rational human being living outside of the Beltway.

One of the most disturbing things about Mr. Fitzgerald's investigation is that it took him two years to come up with such convoluted charges. In reality, the investigation should have lasted no more than five minutes because that's how long it takes to learn that Valerie Plame, CIA employee and wife of Joseph Wilson, was not a covert agent and hadn't been a covert agent for more than five years. Therefore, according to the law, it was legal to tell anyone her name and where she worked. That's the elephant in the room that Mr. Fitzgerald and the press have been trying to ignore.

Instead of ending his investigation when he first bumped into the elephant, Mr. Fitzgerald dragged it along for two years until he could manufacture a crime. And even in that, he failed miserably. But what would you expect? He's a government lawyer and, by definition, he's not the cream of the crop. As such, Mr. Libby should have little trouble proving his innocence.

JOSEPH K. WALTENBAUGH
New Castle

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The greedy legislators' worst friend

If anyone in Pittsburgh is relieved and pleased with our legislators voting to rescind their "midnight grab" of a pay raise, they have one person to thank -- Post-Gazette columnist Brian O'Neill. Without his attention -- nay bulldog tenacity -- I seriously doubt that any such action would be taken (though it's not final).

Thanks, Brian, for staying on the job and not letting it become "yesterday's news."

LORETTA and BOB BARONE
Point Breeze