Americans Need Health Care Now

AMERICANS NEED HEALTH CARE NOW -- (House of Representatives - July 30, 2009)

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Mr. LEWIS of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I rise today because America needs health care, and they need it now. The American people cannot wait. Every day that we wait 14,000 Americans lose their health insurance. 46 years ago, at the March on Washington, I said, ``They tell us to wait. They tell us to be patient.'' We cannot wait, we cannot be patient. People are losing their health, their homes or their very lives because our health system does not work for them. This is not right. It is not just. And we can do better, much better.

It is our moral obligation to lead. The insurance companies do not need our leadership. The drug companies do not need our leadership. They do not need our help. Real, hardworking people need us to lead. We must make sure that in our rush to appease the few, that we do not harm the many. We must adopt a bill that has a strong public health insurance option. We must adopt a bill that makes health premiums affordable to low and middle-income workers. We must not negotiate away our commitment to the working poor and to middle class Americans. This is the kind of leadership Americans need.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. once said, ``Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most shocking and inhumane.'' If we do not protect our most vulnerable hardworking Americans and their families, we will perpetuate this injustice. The time is always right to do what is right. We should not be afraid to do what is right. We must answer the call of history and pass health reform that works for all Americans.

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