The Honorable Harry Reid
Senate Majority Leader
United State Senate
S-221 Capitol Building
Washington, DC 20510
The Honorable Mitch McConnell
Senate Minority Leader
United States Senate
S-230 Capitol Building
Washington, DC 20510
The Honorable Nancy Pelosi
Speaker
H-232 Capitol Building
Washington, DC 20515
The Honorable John Boehner
House Minority Leader
United States House of Representatives
H-204 Capitol Building
Washington, DC 20515
Dear Bipartisan Leaders:
Congress has a chance to pass legislation that enjoys broad, bipartisan support and will make important improvements to American health care. We urge you to make 2008 the year to bring health care into the 21st century by a system of secure, interoperable, electronic health information.
The reasons to support health IT are many. Accurate and up-to-date health records will help avoid many of the estimated 98,000 deaths caused each year due to medical mistakes. A national health IT system will help curb health care inflation, wringing out tens of billions of dollars of paperwork waste. It will help researchers understand how to make the health care delivery system smarter, more efficient and more cost effective. It will give consumers the ability to review their health history in private, to check their providers’ advice, and monitor their progress. And it will provide enhanced security for patient health records. Electronic prescribing also improves safety, yields savings and has wide support.
If health IT does not pass, our health care system will continue to be mired in paperwork. Thousands of lives and billions of dollars will be needlessly lost. Consumers will continue to be harmed by not having vital information about them in the hands of those who care for them and inconvenienced by the need to fill out redundant forms. Health care providers will still struggle to get complete information about their patients, and waste time on paperwork that would be better spent on patient care. We deserve better.
The Divided We Fail partners represent over 50 million consumers. On their behalf we urge you to take a major step forward in reshaping the health care system. The status quo is completely unacceptable and you have the opportunity to begin to build a better health care system for the people in this country.
We are counting on your leadership, this year. We urge you to pass health IT legislation immediately.
AARP
Business Roundtable
National Federation of Independent Business
Service Employees International Union
American Academy of Nursing
American College of Preventive Medicine
American Foundation for the Blind
American Health Care Association
American Medical Women's Association
American Nurses Association
American Society on Aging
Association of American Medical Colleges
Community Action Partnership
Consumers Union
Disabled American Veterans
Faith in Action
Family Caregivers Alliance
Generations United
Healthcare Leadership Council
Human Rights Campaign
National Association of Chain Drug Stores
National Consumers League
National Hispanic Medical Association
National Indian Council on Aging
National Medical Association
National Partnership for Women and Families
National Rural Health Association
NCCNHR: National Consumer Voice for Quality Long-Term Care
Older Women's League
Paralyzed Veterans of America
Republican Main Street Partnership
Research! America