This video from the USA is the trailer of Michael Moore´s film SICKO.
Where is the film “SICKO” by Michael Moore, on health care in the USA, playing in the USA near you?
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Dear Kitty. Some blog 
I live in an unusually liberal suburb in the unusually liberal bay area. Sicko is playing at three different theaters within 20 minutes of here.
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Hi John, do these theaters usually have documentary films?
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For millions of poor people throughout the world, generic drugs manufactured in India are a lifeline. In AIDS-wracked countries like Lesotho and Zimbabwe, more than 90 percent of lifesaving antiretroviral drugs are imported from India.
Novartis is suing the Indian government to block production and export of generic drugs including retrovirals.
Tell Novartis: Drop the Case!
Bob Fertik
Tell Novartis to drop their
case against Indian generics !
Dear Friend,
If you live in a developing country and have HIV/AIDS, TB or another life-threatening illness, your survival may depend on affordable generic drugs manufactured in India.
For years, India’s pharmaceutical industry has produced and exported low-cost generic versions of the world’s most effective medications for diseases ranging from HIV to cancer.
Now, a lawsuit brought by pharmaceutical giant Novartis against the Indian government could cut back production of lifesaving drugs. This suit threatens the health of millions of people who can’t afford the expensive brand name drugs that Novartis and other big pharmaceutical companies produce.
But you can help. Send a letter to Novartis CEO Dr. Daniel Vasella today asking him to drop the case against the Indian government.
CARE is hand-delivering letters to Novartis throughout the trial, so please take a moment now to join the nearly 14,000 people just like you who have already written Dr. Vasella.
As you may know, CARE is a leading humanitarian organization fighting global poverty through the empowerment of women. CARE believes a balance must be struck between patents and public health. But a lawsuit that threatens access to lifesaving drugs does not make sense. Poor families around the world depend on these medicines – and the case could be decided any day now.
Please take a moment now to tell Novartis CEO Dr. Vasella to drop the case and protect the health of millions of the world’s poor.
So many people in poor communities depend on India’s affordable generic medications to keep them healthy and productive. Please join me and take action today to keep these lifesaving medicines within reach.
Sincerely,
Helene D. Gayle, MD, MPH
President and CEO, CARE
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Bush, Public Health and Education
Havana, Jul 16 (Prensa Latina) Cuban President Fidel Castro criticized the policy of the US government on education, public health and its projection towards Latin America, and highlighted the progress and solidary efforts of Cuba in these fields.
In a new reflection titled “Bush, Public Health and Education” published here Sunday, the Cuban Revolution”s leader expressed: “I will not refer to Bush”s health and education, but to that of his neighbors. It was not an improvised declaration. The AP agency tells us what his opening words were: “Tenemos corazones grandes en este país” (We have big hearts in this country); he said this in Spanish in front of 250 representatives of private and religious groups, foundations and NGOs who had come to Washington with all expenses paid by his government. Of these, some 100 came from the United States.
“The meeting, called the White House Conference on the Americas, is part of the ideas outlined by Bush as he began a tour of five Latin American countries at the beginning of March about what his government was hoping to do for the region in the short time still remaining of his term in office.” “Bush called the conference in order to discuss several subjects, especially education and health. “It”s Š in the interests of the United States that our neighborhood be healthy and educated”, he said in improvised declarations during a chat with six of the attendees, from Guatemala, the United States, Brazil, Haiti and Mexico, who sat at the table with him in a colloquium”, the press agency added.
He said some incredible things, like “the hard work we”re doing in the neighborhood”.
Bush spoke, as did the Secretary of the Treasury, the Under Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs and the Under Secretary of State for Public Affairs. Together with them, several members of the Cabinet chaired the working groups in which the meeting was arranged. They all talked until they were blue in the face.
They mentioned that Bush had created a training center in Panama that graduated more than 100 doctors from six Central American countries. They very emphatically referred to the Comfort, “one of the best medical ships in the world that had just called on port in Panama after visiting Guatemala”.
“Bush dedicated 55 minutes of his time to this activity which took place in a hotel in the city of Arlington, Virginia, on the outskirts of Washington D.C.” Then, as bold as you like, Secretary of State Condolezza Rice, joined the voices to speak about Cuba.
According to another news agency, when our Council of State, complying with constitutional norms, had just called the elections, she declared that “the United States hopes that the Cubans themselves will decide their future”, and she added: “Washington will not tolerate the transition from one dictator to another”.
In his opening speech, Bush addressed really unusual concepts for the head of a planetary global empire, very conscious of his power and of his personal role, reported in detail by the Spanish press agency EFE: “The President of the United States, George W. Bush, today urged the governments of Latin America to be honest, transparent and open.” (Š) “The leader affirmed that societies which are open and transparent are those which will lead to hopeful tomorrows.” “We expect governments to be honest and transparent (Š) We reject the notion that it”s okay for there to be corruption in governmentŠ” “It is also in our interest to help a neighbor in need. It renews our soul. It lifts our collective spirit. I believe to whom much is given, much is required. We”ve been given a lot as a nation, and therefore, I believe we”re required to help,” he insisted.
Bush knows that he is lying and that his tall tales are hard to swallow, but he doesn”t care. He is confident that if he repeats it a thousand times, many will finally believe him. Why so much trickery? What essentially torments him? When did all this rushing come up? Bush is discovering that the economic and political system of his empire cannot compete with Cuba in vital services, such as healthcare and education, although this country has been attacked and blockaded for almost 50 years. Everyone knows that the United States” specialty concerning education is the brain drain. The International Labor Organization has indicated that “47 percent of people born abroad that complete their Doctorate in the United States stay in that country.” Yet another example of the plunder: “There are more Ethiopian physicians in Chicago than in all of Ethiopia.” In Cuba, where healthcare is not a commodity, we can do things that Bush cannot even dream of.
Third World countries do not have the resources to set up scientific research centers, while Cuba has created these even if her own professionals have often been enticed and encouraged to defect.
Our Yes I Can method of teaching people to read and write is today available to all Latin American countries, free of charge, and the countries that choose to use the program receive support to adapt it to their own characteristics and to produce the printed materials and the corresponding videos.
Countries such as Bolivia are implementing the program in Spanish, Quechua and Aymara. The numbers of those who have learned to read and write there in just one year exceed the number of those who have been taught to read and write by the empire in all of Latin America, if indeed there is anyone. And I am not speaking about other countries like Venezuela which has accomplished veritable heroic deeds in education in a very short time.
Yes I Can is of benefit to other societies outside the Western Hemisphere. Suffice it to say that New Zealand is using the program to eradicate illiteracy in their Maori population.
Instead of having one training center for medical professionals in Central America, which has trained about 100 -and we”re glad for this– our country today has tens of thousands of students from Latin America and the Caribbean on full scholarships who spend six years training as doctors in Cuba, free of charge. Of course, we do not exclude any American youth who take their education very seriously.
We cooperate with Venezuela in the education of more than 20,000 youths, who study medicine and train in clinics in the poor neighborhoods, tutored by Cuban specialists, so that they can get acquainted with their future and difficult job.
The Comfort, with over 800 people on board, that is, medical staff and crew, will not be able to look after great numbers of people. It is impossible to carry out medical programs episodically. Physical therapy, for example, in many cases requires months of work. Cuba provides permanent services to people in polyclinics and well-equipped hospitals, and the patients can be cared for any time of day or night. We have also trained the necessary physical therapy specialists.
The eye surgery also requires special skills. In our country ophthalmologic centers perform more than 50,000 eye surgeries on Cubans each year and look after 27 kinds of diseases. There are no waiting lists for cornea transplants which need special arrangements. Let an active investigation be done in the United States and you will see how many people really need to be operated on there; since they have never been examined by an ophthalmologist they will attribute their eye problems to other causes and run the risk of becoming blind or of having their vision seriously impaired. You would find out that there are millions.
In the abovementioned figure I did not include the hundreds of thousands of Latin Americans and Caribbean people some of whom are operated on in Cuba, but most in their respective countries, by Cuban ophthalmologists. In Bolivia alone, they are more than 100,000 each year. In this instance, Bolivian doctors educated in the Latin American School of Medicine (ELAM) take part in the surgeries alongside our Cuban specialists.
Let”s just see how the Comfort will make out in Haiti, providing health services for a week. There, in 123 of the country”s 134 communes there are Cuban doctors working alongside ELAM graduates, or Haitian students in the last year of medical school, fighting AIDS and various tropical diseases.
The problem is that the United States cannot do what Cuba is doing. On the contrary, it brutally pressures the manufacturing companies of the excellent medical equipment that is supplied to our country to prevent them from replacing certain computer programs or some spare parts that are under United States patents. I could cite concrete cases and the names of the companies. It is disgusting, even though we have solutions that make us more invulnerable in this field.
Less than six months ago Bush had not yet invented the idea of making fuel production universal, from foodstuff inside and outside the United States. Those of us who are aware of the value of fats and protein foods for human nutrition know what the consequences are for pregnant women, children, teenagers, adults and the elderly if they lack these. The brunt of the scarcity will fall on the shoulders of the least developed countries, in other words, on the largest part of humanity. It will surprise no one that this will be accompanied by increased prices for basic foodstuffs and social instability. Yesterday, Friday 13, the price of oil was 79.18 US dollars a barrel; another consequence of the money rush and the war in Iraq.
Barely 48 hours ago, the United States Secretary of Homeland Security, Michael Chertoff, said that “he had the gut feeling that a terrorist attack could happen in the country during the summer”. The Secretary of State, and subsequently the President of the United States himself, said something similar. But while they were giving information about a potential risk, they were also taking great pains to calm public opinion.
The government of the United States sees and hears all, with or without legal authority. Furthermore, it possesses numerous intelligence and counterintelligence services that are provided with copious economic resources for espionage. It can obtain all the security information it needs without kidnapping, torturing or murdering persons in secret prisons. Everybody knows the real economic purposes pursued through world violence and force. They can prevent any attack on their people, unless there is some imperial need to deliver a bang so that they can carry on with and justify the brutal war which has been declared against the culture, religion, economy and independence of other peoples.
I must conclude.
Tomorrow, Sunday, is Children”s Day. I think of them as I write this reflection. I dedicate it to them.
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Who’s Right about Kaiser —— Michael Moore or SEIU?
Posted by: “bigraccoon” bigraccoon@earthlink.net redwoodsaurus
Sun Sep 9, 2007 5:42 am (PST)
from Monthly Review’s MRzine
http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/andrews050907.html
Who’s Right about Kaiser — Michael Moore or SEIU?
by Charles Andrews
Thanks to the Watergate scandal, Michael Moore’s
documentary SiCKO was able to report some history of the
Kaiser Permanente health maintenance organization (HMO).
It’s history that Kaiser would prefer you do not know.
Moore included tape of President Nixon and chief aide John
Erlichman discussing what would become the HMO Act of
1973. Based on conversations with executives at Kaiser
Permanente, the largest health plan in California, Erlichman
assured Nixon that the incentives at Kaiser run toward less
medical care. The less care provided to members paying a
flat premium, the more money Kaiser makes. Nixon
expressed his approval.
To no one’s surprise, Kaiser Permanente issued a rebuttal,
although it is surprising how clumsy a case Kaiser makes.
Attempting to discredit Erlichman, Kaiser cites two documents
from the National Archives that supposedly refute Moore’s
evidence. One document turns out to be irrelevant, but the
other one, a Feb. 6, 1971 letter from chairman Edgar Kaiser
to Erlichman, is a gem.
Mr. Kaiser explained that Kaiser physicians, organized as the
Permanente Group, receive both a salary and a share in any
surplus left over from the contractual payments by the Kaiser
Health Plan to the Permanente Group. The incentive is to
minimize the number of physicians in ratio to Kaiser
members. Chairman Kaiser’s letter goes on to complain
about several features of the draft HMO Act. In particular, he
insisted, “Organized health care programs, including
associated physicians, must have a significant incentive to
elect the HMO framework. The rate-based, rather than
cost-based, method of payment . . . could provide such an
incentive.”
In other words, said Kaiser, you must allow our plan to
retain a difference between premium income and the cost of
delivering care.
The drive to minimize care caused Kaiser much
embarrassment in 2002 when the Los Angeles Times
reported that Kaiser “awarded financial bonuses to call
center clerks who spent the least amount of time on the
phone with each patient and limited the number of doctors’
appointments” (“Kaiser Clerks Paid More for Helping Less,”
Los Angeles Times, 17 May 2002)
Despite providing evidence that confirms SiCKO’s reporting
(although buried in a Web link), Kaiser praises itself for being
“a non-profit health plan.” In fact, Kaiser aims to generate
the same surplus that everyone recognizes as profit in
ordinary corporations. A “non-profit” is different only
because it is tax-exempt and does not pay dividends to
shareholders.
Certainly, Kaiser executives are not of a non-profit mind.
Kaiser chief executive officer George Halvorson takes around
$2 million a year, and dozens of Kaiser top officials get
$500,000, $700,000 and $900,000 a year.
In its so-called rebuttal to Michael Moore, Kaiser ends up
taking pride in having “served as a model for the HMO Act of
1973” — the very legislation that legalized the big HMOs
skewered by SiCKO.
Enter SEIU
United Healthcare Workers-West (UHW-W), a large subunion
within the Service International Employees Union (SEIU),
represents many Kaiser workers. One might expect UHW-W
to recognize in SiCKO a wonderful opportunity to expose
and denounce Kaiser Permanente’s systematic incentives to
minimize the care provided to members. The barely hidden
profit drive makes work at Kaiser intense, frustrating, and
stressful for many Kaiser employees.
Instead, UHW-W attacked Michael Moore for “smearing the
reputation of one of our nation’s most progressive,
reform-minded, pro-worker health-care organizations:
America’s premier not-for-profit, pre-paid, integrated
health-care delivery system, Kaiser Permanente.”
UHW-W does acknowledge that Kaiser packed a dazed,
disoriented Carol Ann Reyes, 63, into a taxi and had her
dropped in the skid row area of Los Angeles. After all,
viewers of SiCKO cannot forget the observation camera that
recorded Reyes walking aimlessly in the street, still in a
hospital gown and diaper, trying to figure out where she
was and what she should do next.
However, UHW-W simply ignores Nixon’s delight in
discovering Kaiser’s essential profit motive, except to drag
up a statement by Edgar Kaiser . . . from 1938.
UHW-W insists there is “a fundamental distinction between a
not-for-profit, pre-paid, integrated health-care delivery
system and a stereotypical, for-profit insurance company.”
As far as the members who represent a “medical loss” to
both kinds of health plans can see, the main difference is
that one displays “Inc.” at the end of its name while the
other does not.
Finally, UHW-W expresses pleasure at its 10-year
labor-management partnership with Kaiser Permanente.
Remember the bonuses for phone center employees who
kept members from making doctor appointments? UHW-W
officials served as straw bosses, working with Kaiser bosses
urging clerks to get with the program. Now the Kaiser-SEIU
partnership extends to distorting history.
Phony Health Reform vs. Equal Care for All
At a time when health reform is on the national agenda,
thanks in good part to Michael Moore’s SiCKO, Kaiser
Permanente put forward its own proposal (George C.
Halvorson, Francis J. Crosson, and Steve Zatkin, “A Proposal
To Cover The Uninsured In California,” Health Affairs 26.1,
12 December 2006). Kaiser wants to require that everyone
must purchase a health plan as a matter of law. Although
the government should offer a bottom-of-the-barrel medical
plan, most of the health business should go to private
insurers and HMOs.
Instead of rejecting this corporate despotism, UHW-W tells
health reform activists, “While Kaiser’s vision for getting to
universal coverage may not be exactly the same as ours, we
should acknowledge that their ultimate goal is very much
the same.” UHW-W officials ignore the fact that capital and
labor have directly opposed visions of health care. Kaiser
promotes the business game plan.
The working-class current in health reform is embodied in the
concept of Equal Care for All, implemented as a universal
public health plan. It breaks the tie between your health
care and your individual wealth. When you walk into a
doctor’s office or arrive at a hospital, it should not matter
whether you are rich or poor.
Currently, the movement for Equal Care for All has a concrete
focus on John Conyers’ HR 676 legislation in Congress. More
than 300 trade union bodies have endorsed HR 676. To be
sure, UHW-W is one of them; those who advocate
labor-management partnership easily sit on both sides of a
fence. It is worth noting that one of the two main trade
unions in the drive for HR 676 is the California Nurses
Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee. (The
Steelworkers are the other one.) CNA/NNOC represents
most Kaiser Permanente registered nurses in California, and
it firmly rejects partnership collusion with the employer.
The front-running Democratic presidential candidates
(Clinton, Obama, Edwards) all make noises about health
reform, but each of their proposals is much closer to Kaiser
Permanente’s plan than to Equal Care for All. These
candidates bow down before the private health insurers and
HMOs rather than telling them: the people have decided, it is
time for you to go into the sunset. SEIU and UHW-W will
spend millions of dollars promoting misleading generalities
about health reform while they wait to see which Democratic
candidate and which phony health reform they must support.
No wonder SEIU could not accept the truth about Kaiser in
Michael Moore’s SiCKO.
Charles Andrews is a Kaiser plan member who has heard
from dedicated caregivers there what things are really like.
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« Sicko », de Michael Moore
Armé d’un fil et d’une aiguille, Rick, un jeune chômeur, referme lui-même la plaie longue et profonde qui parcout son genoux : « je n’ai pas les moyens de me payer de véritables soins. » Le plan suivant nous montre Adam, la cinquantaine passée, penché sur la scie électrique qui lui a récemment emporté deux doigts. Un accident domestique comme il s’en produit souvent. Mais lorsqu’il est arrivé à l’hôpital, ses deux bouts de doigt en poche, on lui a sorti les tarifs : 12 000 dollars pour lui recoller l’annulaire, et 60 000 pour le majeur. Adam n’a pu se payer que l’intervention à 12 000 dollars.
Dans quel pays du Tiers-monde ces images ont-elles été tournées ? Aux Etats-Unis d’Amérique, la première puissance économique au monde. On a tous entendu dire que le système de santé américain était très inégalitaire. Mais le dernier film de Michael Moore, Sicko, permet de prendre la mesure de la catastrophe. C’est également un puissant plaidoyer contre ce système de santé rongé par des mutuelles privées uniquement préoccupées par leurs marges de profit.
Comme Adam et Rick, 50 millions d’Américains n’ont pas d’assurance maladie. On estime que 18 000 d’entre eux en meurent, chaque année. « Mais ce n’est pas le sujet du film », explique Michael Moore. Le sujet du film, c’est l’enfer auquel sont confrontés de très nombreux Américains qui ont une mutuelle, lorsque par malheur ils tombent malades. Car le fait d’avoir souscrit une telle assurance n’est pas une garantie que vos soins seront payés. Les mutuelles privées n’ont tout simplement pas intérêt à vous rembourser : il y va de leurs bénéfices. Le remboursement d’un soin est une « perte » ; le refus de le rembourser, un « gain » : ainsi s’exprime-t-on, dans les hautes sphères de ces entreprises qui spéculent sur la santé de millions de travailleurs américains.
Fidèle à sa méthode, Michael Moore recueille toute une série de témoignages poignants qui se complètent pour former une seule et même dénonciation. Par exemple, une mère explique comment son enfant, victime d’un malaise soudain, est mort parce que sa mutuelle refusait qu’il soit reçu aux urgences les plus proches de son domicile.
Dans le bâtiment des urgences, des médecins étaient là qui auraient pu sauver l’enfant. Mais au téléphone, les ordres de sa mutuelle étaient formels : nous ne payeront pas les soins s’ils sont effectués ici. Dès lors, rien à faire : « circulez ». Ulcérée, la mère protestait, insistait, s’acharnait. Mais rien n’y fit. Le temps de se rendre dans le « bon » hôpital, l’enfant s’était éteint.
Sicko rapporte un certain nombre d’histoires dramatiques du même ordre, souvent très émouvantes. La mort n’est pas la seule option : les plus chanceux s’en sortiront avec d’énormes dettes, ou encore d’insupportables souffrances physiques ou psychiques. Au fur et à mesure que le film relate ces vies brisées sur l’autel du profit, on comprend qu’il ne s’agit pas de « faits divers » ou d’exceptions, mais de tragédies fréquentes, conséquences inévitables d’un véritable système.
Ce système, Moore montre aussi ceux qui en profitent : les grands patrons de l’industrie de la santé et les politiciens à leur solde (dans tous les sens du terme). Les bénéfices records, la corruption, les doubles discours : Moore intercale tout cela, sous formes d’images d’archives, entre les différents témoignages. Le contraste est poignant entre, d’un côté, cette caste de millionnaires pétrie de cynisme qui s’arroge le droit de vie ou de mort – et, de l’autre, ces familles dignes, courageuses, mais pauvres, qui racontent leur drame. Au passage, Moore – déjà la bête noire de Bush et des Républicains – discrédite les politiciens démocrates, et notamment Hillary Clinton, dont il dévoile la vénalité et la soumission complète aux intérêts de la classe dirigeante américaine.
Mais les témoignages les plus impressionnants sont peut-être ceux des anciens employés des grandes mutuelles privées, qui ont démissionné pour ne plus se sentir complices. Une ancienne secrétaire raconte, en larmes, qu’elle savait d’un coup d’œil si un dossier de candidature allait être rejeté par ses chefs. Car il faut postuler pour souscrire une assurance privée : celle-ci ne va pas prendre le risque de couvrir quelqu’un dont le passé médical augmente la probabilité qu’il soit malade ! Telle est la complète absurdité de l’affaire. Mais comme le disait Shakespeare, « il y a de la méthode dans cette folie ». Un médecin aillant quitté l’une de ces entreprises explique que son travail consistait à débusquer des vices de procédure, dans les dossiers des assurés, pour éviter d’avoir à payer leurs soins. Un autre raconte qu’il était généreusement augmenté chaque fois qu’il parvenait à réduire le nombre de remboursements. Or plus le mal est grave, plus les soins sont chers, et plus les enjeux financiers, pour la compagnie, sont importants. Ainsi, la course au profit entre en conflit direct avec la santé publique.
Une fois ce constat établi, Michael Moore entreprend un périple dans trois pays – le Canada, la Grande-Bretagne et la France – où il discute avec la population, les médecins et les employés des hôpitaux. L’objectif de Moore est de créer un contraste frappant entre les systèmes de santé de ces pays et celui des Etats-Unis. Ce faisant, Moore force le trait. Les travailleurs français, canadiens et britanniques ne partageront pas son enthousiasme pour leurs systèmes de santé respectifs, que leurs classes dirigeantes, d’ailleurs, ne cessent d’attaquer. Mais Moore ne fait pas dans le détail, pour ainsi dire, et ce jeu de contrastes lui donne une occasion de déployer son excellent humour. Pour finir, il amène un groupe d’Américains malades à Cuba, où ils se verront accorder gratuitement – comme c’est le cas pour tous les Cubains – les soins de qualité qui leur étaient refusés aux Etats-Unis.
Ce film a eu un énorme impact, outre-Atlantique, où il a suscité, chez des milliers de personnes, la volonté de s’organiser et de lutter pour le droit de tout citoyen américain à une véritable assurance maladie. Des réunions publiques ont eu lieu ; des comités de lutte se sont constitués. C’est un symptôme de la grande fermentation sociale à l’oeuvre, dans ce pays.
En France, également, nul doute que le film sera un succès. Il comprend d’ailleurs un avertissement pour la classe ouvrière française. La droite et le MEDEF rêvent de démanteler la sécurité sociale et d’ouvrir davantage le secteur de la santé aux mutuelles privées. Lors de la présentation de Sicko, à Cannes, Michael Moore nous a prévenus : « ne laissez pas Sarkozy s’inspirer de notre système ». Les jeunes et les travailleurs qui n’en seraient pas encore convaincus ont tout intérêt à aller voir ce film.
Jérôme Métellus (PCF)
Publication : mardi 11 septembre 2007
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