from Evan Bowman – AFSCME Local 328 representing over 8,000 healthcare workers in Portland, Oregon and across our nation, and Media & Communications Co-chair of Higher Education Labor United
I rise in support of this resolution both as a healthcare IT worker witnessing the ravages of privatization and profiteering on Oregon’s healthcare system, as well as a patient with multiple chronic autoimmune issues. The impacts of privatization and profiteering on me and others as workers are massive. The only answer to this is union power.
In order to seek permission to buy up struggling competitors, our employer rashly, and without thought for the impact on patients, “strategically restructured” hundreds out of their jobs to keep their bond rating. The incestuous and abusive relationship between healthcare providers and medical insurance companies further removes the organization from our mission of improving the health of Oregonians. Reimbursements along with federal and state allocations continue to fall behind the costs of providing care. As COVID-19 turns from Pandemic to Endemic, we have no way of knowing how hospital budgets must adjust for our new medical environment. In addition, climate change is increasingly impacting the cost of providing healthcare. Insurers and shareholders are taking a larger and larger profit as the degradation of care continues.
As a patient with Crohn’s Disease, Multiple Sclerosis and Ankylosing Spondylitis, about 10% of my budget and my time goes to maintaining my health, and I presently owe approximately $2,500 to my employer for a recent MRI. Without the power of all of you helping me, I would need to pay about 2,000% of my budget on healthcare. Even with that solidarity, I regularly must choose between paying for medication or paying to go out for drinks with fellow front-line workers. In addition, I must only use the doctors at my employer or I will need to pay double; however, waiting times for specialists are 6-9 months. Anyone getting company store vibes? And don’t get me started on trying to get good doctors for my four children or for my 80-year old parents.
We in AFSCME Local 328 are doing our best. For example, we recently helped pass safe staffing level legislation for Oregon, but it was a fight even in a deep-blue state.
I’ll close with a quote, “In our hands is placed a power greater than their hoarded gold, greater than the might of atoms magnified a thousandfold; We can bring to birth a new world from the ashes of the old, For the Union makes us strong!”