Sequim Gazette Editorial and Letters to the Editor

Here are some thoughts from an old pharmacist who has been around here since 1970. These were handed to U.S. Rep. Norm Dicks with R.Ph, (for registered pharmacist) after my name.

In return, I got a form letter from him addressed to Dear R.Ph., but it did not even have my name.

Here are the points I made, with comments.

_ The present health care reform is much like the Clintons', which we all remember was too big a pill to swallow at one time. I would think someone would learn from the past.

Comment: There has been a lot of grass-roots input from meetings hosted by the League of Women Voters, and the response has gone by the wayside or never was read. Instead, the special interests like Pharma and big insurance companies have been invited to the president's health care reform meetings.

The most common input from the grass-roots meetings has been, "Let's have a single-payer system," which has been ignored by Congress. Responses back to these grass-roots groups have lead to the frustrated meetings with our representatives.

As a hospital commissioner, I could not even be part of the selected people at Rep. Dicks' "listening session" held in Port Angeles.

This leads me to questions: Where is the control over lobbyists the new president promised? They are spending more than $1.5 million a day on Congress.

_ Let's fix some of the mistakes that have been made on health care already in the past eight years.

Comment: Why not fix Medicare Part D? Take it away from the insurance companies. Make it the single-payer system that it should have been. This would give the average Medicare patient something they can understand and save Medicare D the 20- to 25-percent administration fee the insurance companies charge. Today, Medicare administration is less than 5 percent.

_ We do need health care reform, but we need more than words to address the shortage of primary care doctors. That is most important to the rural areas of the country.

Comment: We need to fix the amount paid per Medicare patient by state. Fees paid to doctors, hospitals and all services in Washington are way below states such as Florida, Texas and New York, to name a few - all because of politics. And Clallam County is one of the lowest in the state of Washington. But to fix this, we need to take the politics out of health care.

_ Other fixes: Let's control or stop TV ads for drugs and medical devices. Drug companies spend two to three times as much on TV ads as they do on research. Some of the ads are for drugs that should be off patent and be one-tenth the cost as generic. Others are combinations of two drugs, one off-patent, one on-patent, so it brings the drug companies billions more per year. I won't mention any names.

Much of the research money on new drugs comes from the government. When the drug is developed, it is given back to the big drug companies to make billions. Where is the return to the government?

_ Lastly, we have a president making back-door deals with the big drug companies. The amount, $80 billion, which they already have gotten through increased prices. And for these "savings," which are not there, the big drug companies will not face price controls. Where is the transparency our president promised? Some of these fixes could occur as we develop a true health care reform and at the same time earn back some of the trust the American people deserve.

Jim Cammack founded Jim's Pharmacy in Port Angeles. He lives at Lake Sutherland and holds the Position 1 seat on the board of commissioners of Clallam County Hospital District 2, better known as Olympic Medical Center. His term expires at the end of this year and he is seeking re-election.



But meanwhile ...



Veterans groups oppose HR 3200

On July 30, several veteran groups sent letters to Congress expressing their concerns on proposed health care legislation.

On behalf of 24 million veterans they wrote:

"We are writing to express grave concerns about HR 3200, America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009. As currently drafted, we would oppose this legislation because it could limit the health care choices for vet-

erans, increase the cost of health care for veterans, deny coverage to dependent family members of veterans and threaten the quality of health care offered to veterans through VA health care system."

The letters, which I received (Sept. 3)run several pages and I have provided the source documents to the newspaper. I further will post the documents on my blog site at www.ghgop.org.

The pdf documents were provided to me directly by the Disabled American Veterans (DAV) association and include official signatures of: VFW (Veterans of Foreign Wars); AMVETS (American Veterans); DAV, Blinded Veterans Association; Jewish War Veterans of the USA; Military Order of the Purple Heart of the USA; Vietnam Veterans of America; The American Legion; Wounded Warrior Project; and Paralyzed Veterans of America.

Among the issues of concern are: penalty tax for failure to enroll in an "acceptable" health insurance; disincentive for employers to hire members of the Reserve components; multiple health care options; independence of the DOD and VA health care systems; third party reimbursements for treatment of nonservice-connected conditions; and penalty tax on Reserve components federalized or activated by the governor.

These are real concerns by real patriots and should not be dismissed as rantings of an ill-informed few.

Such correspondence illustrates just how unacceptable this legislation is. We need to slow down the legislative process to allow reasoned debate and improve upon our health care system with better options, maximum choices and fiscal restraint.

Randy Dutton

Cmdr., CDR, USNR (Ret), Montesano

Dutton, a Republican, ran unsuccessfully against incumbent Rep. Lynn Kessler for the 24th state House district that includes Clallam County.