In an attempt to generate discussion on health-care reform, the Wisconsin Union Directorate's Society and Politics Committee kicked off the year Wednesday with a town hall-style Q&A session led by a panel of Madison-area experts.
Panelists discussed a variety of topics concerning the health-care debate and addressed possible solutions to advocate reform, including a single-payer system, a public option plan, socializing medicine and rationing health care.
The panel agreed that both reform of insurance companies and reform of the health-care system is needed.
Bioethics professor Tom Oliver of the Population Heath Institute and Dr. Richard Rieselbach, a nephrologist at UW Hospital, said restructuring medical care so care providers work in teams would be more efficient from a financial perspective.
The teams would put primary-care physicians at the forefront, with other team members dealing with of more minor health problems.
CEO of Access Community Health Centers Gordon Derzon pointed out that despite controversy over a public plan for health care, 80 million Americans are already on a public health-care plan, namely those on Medicare, Medicaid and in the military.
Nicole Safar, a legal analyst at Planned Parenthood, also critiqued the role of the media throughout the health-care debate of the past few months.
""Activists in Wisconsin have been out there, making calls, going to town hall meetings ... and the media have done a really poor job of presenting this in an objective way,"" she said.
The panel urged students and community members to continue discussing health care and pushing reform through community involvement and grassroots organizations such as Dane County Grassroots Network and Organizing for America.
WUD Society and Politics Committee meetings are held on Tuesdays at 6:30 p.m. in Memorial Union, TITU.
