Three forums offer chance for residents to study health care issues
Public discussions about the nation's health care system staged Wednesday night in Arlington Heights, Elk Grove Village and Lincolnshire were hardly the type of rancorous, bare-knuckled throw-down that's enthralled the media and political pundits in recent weeks.
Sessions in Arlington Heights and Lincolnshire featured panels that overall leaned toward Democratic reform positions while the Elk Grove Village session panelists were skeptical that what's in the current proposals constitutes an improvement over the status quo.
All three affairs were low-key, however, with smaller audiences of 40 to 100 people that calmly listened to speakers' presentations.
"It's nice to hear both sides," said Joe Hafenscher of Arlington Heights, who felt he got the Republican view at a forum with Rep. Mark Kirk in August at the Arlington Heights village hall and a Democratic view at the forum at First United Methodist Church sponsored by the League of Women Voters. While he found the sessions informative, he said he hadn't made up his mind yet.
At the Elk Grove Village forum, organized by the grass roots group We the People, Dr. Roger Weise, medical director of the Alexian Brothers Older Adult Institute, and insurance consultant Blair Farwell spoke at the public library.
Weise said if the government gives everyone health insurance, it may lead to irresponsibility on the patient's part.
"If you take all the responsibility away from the human being and you give them something for nothing, it does not make them better citizens, it does not make them make better decisions," Weise said.
Farwell said the insurance companies are well aware that change has to happen and they want to work with the government. While the health insurance industry opposes some parts of the Democratic proposals, he said the companies and the government agree 80 percent to 90 percent of the time when it comes to reform.
At the Arlington Heights forum, though, James Duffet, executive director of the Campaign for Better Health Care, said he would like to see a single-payer system, eliminating the insurance companies as middlemen, something none of the plans is proposing.
"I feel like they're a leach on our system," he said, complaining of the money eaten up by administrative costs.
Panelist Dr. John Sage, a family physician who lives in Arlington Heights and practices in Mount Prospect, said he was disappointed the Democratic proposals don't provide torte reform to bring down medical malpractice costs.
In Lincolnshire, the presentation, led by a pair of representatives from a nonpartisan Washington, D.C., group called the Concord Coalition, dealt with the U.S. economy, the nation's deficit, tax policy and the financial impact of health care. The event was sponsored by a political group called the Tenth Congressional District Democrats and WCPT radio.
• Daily Herald staff writers Russell Lissau, Kevin Kovanich and James Kane contributed to this report.