FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: July 10, 2007

Partnership for Quality Care Launches Campaign to Support Children's Health Insurance and Decrease Tobacco Use

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: July 10, 2007
CONTACT: Kate Navarro-McKay, 646-246-5906

Supporting Expansion of SCHIP & Calling for Increase in Federal Tobacco Tax

Washington, DC-- The Partnership for Quality Care (PQC), a unique coalition of America's health providers and caregivers, today launched its Cover Kids Now campaign. The PQC's print ad displays a hand holding a "winning prescription" for Congress: to insure more children through the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) by raising the tax on cigarettes.

The print ad directs readers to a Web site, www.CoverKidsNow.org, where they can contact their elected representatives and advocate for an expansion of the federal SCHIP program and increase in the federal tobacco tax.

"Fully funding SCHIP is not only the right thing to do, it's the smart thing to do." said George C. Halvorson, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Kaiser Foundation Health Plan and Hospitals. "By covering millions more children, an expanded SCHIP program will help providers serve patients and improve quality, expand access, and contain costs without compromising care."

"Increasing the tobacco tax to support SCHIP is a win-win proposition," said Dennis Rivera, leader of million-member SEIU Healthcare, and PQC Chairman. "Tobacco taxes are a proven deterrent to smoking, especially among young people, and they will help decrease the rate of tobacco-related diseases many years down the road. The federal tobacco tax was increased when SCHIP was created in 1997, and it makes sense to raise it again to support the program's expansion."

Since its launch in May 2007, the Partnership for Quality Care has focused on the reauthorization and expansion of SCHIP to cover millions more uninsured children. PQC member organizations have sponsored public events with members of Congress on SCHIP nationwide, including: Columbia, South Carolina; Oakland, California; Broward County, Florida; Providence, Rhode Island; Portland, Oregon; Los Angeles, California; Seattle, Washington; Green Bay, Wisconsin; Trenton, NJ; and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

"There are almost nine million uninsured children in the United States, and every day our providers see children in emergency rooms for complications that could have been avoided with more cost-effective and timely care," said Greater New York Hospital Association (GNYHA) President Kenneth E. Raske. "I can think of no more important goal than making sure every child in the United States has health insurance, and protecting and expanding SCHIP funding is a critical step towards achieving that goal."

Recent polls have demonstrated high public support for increasing the federal tobacco tax in order to support health insurance for children, and increased tobacco taxes have been demonstrated to reduce the rate of smoking. SCHIP, which Congress must reauthorize this year, insures more than 6 million children annually.

"Catholic Healthcare West believes that every person has a fundamental right to high-quality healthcare," said Lloyd Dean, CEO of Catholic Healthcare West and PQC member. "This historic partnership supports full funding of SCHIP because we believe it is a necessary first step towards meaningful reform of our healthcare system and ensuring that high quality healthcare is affordable to everyone—especially the poor and most vulnerable in our society."

"The mission of the Daughters of Charity Health System is to provide excellent healthcare, and especially to serve and advocate for the poor," said Robert Issai, President and CEO, Daughters of Charity Health System. "SCHIP will help millions of children obtain the healthcare they so vitally need."

To view the print ad, please click on: http://www.box.net/shared/static/xsv2ec71n9.pdf

The Cover Kids Now campaign can be found by clicking on: http://www.CoverKidsNow.org

About the PQC

Launched in May 2007, the Partnership for Quality Care is a unique nationwide organization, a labor-management partnership of healthcare providers and healthcare workers. It includes more than 1 million workers, as well as public, private, religious, teaching and nonprofit hospitals and integrated health systems caring for more than 45 million patients annually.

The PQC will work in 2007 and 2008 at the federal, state and local levels to advance reliable and affordable access to health care coverage for everyone in America within a reformed health care system that aggressively promotes improved quality and efficiency.

With an initial budget of at least $5 million, this unprecedented healthcare partnership will educate communities and elected representatives across the country through events, direct mail, grassroots and online organizing, media, and more.

As part of this reform effort, the PQC has released its Joint Principles for a Reformed American Healthcare System. Those principles are to:

• Ensure universal health care coverage for all Americans;
• Improve the quality and efficiency of health care services by adopting clinical best practices and promoting organized systems of care;
• Establish a stable, equitable, broad-based, and predictable health care financing system;
• Promote affordability and address rising health care costs by advancing opportunities to achieve the greatest value for our health care dollars;
• Provide meaningful individual choice of providers and plans while promoting preventive care, protecting consumers from the costs of major illnesses, and improving the management of chronic conditions; and
• Achieve greater reliability in health care coverage, including improved portability of coverage and continuity of care.
  

Click here to read the PDF