Dear Neighbor:

Last month I spoke with the Secretary of Health, Kathleen Sebelius, during a Ways & Means Committee hearing about the need for health care reform. We both agreed that America can’t afford to wait for health care reform – we urgently need to fix it. Rising health care costs are crushing the budgets of families and American businesses, making us less competitive in a global economy, putting Medicare in jeopardy, and hurting our nation’s fiscal bottom line. In addition, far too many Americans continue to go without basic health care at all, leading to more sick days, lower productivity, and greater costs when they finally show up in the emergency room to treat a condition which could have been nipped in the bud with proper preventive care.

What does this mean for you? I can assure you that I will work with President Obama and Secretary Sebelius to reform our health care system to reduce costs, preserve your choice of doctors and plans, and assure affordable, quality health care for all Americans.

I also want to let you know that as a member of the Ways & Means Committee, I have introduced bi-partisan legislation that would prohibit health insurance companies from engaging in “gender rating,” a practice which charges women more for health insurance premiums than men. As a woman and having been in the hospital recently for the birth of my son, I understand how expensive health care can be. Click here to read my “Top 5 Reasons Health Insurance Isn’t Fair to Women.”

Health Care Reform Basics:

• COST, CHOICE, QUALITY


• YOU GOT IT, YOU LIKE IT, YOU KEEP IT: If you are happy with the insurance you have now, you can keep it.


• NO’s NOT THE ANSWER: The Just Say No crowd working to defeat health care reform are essentially placing an $1,100 a year tax on American families in terms of extra premiums to pay for a broken system—and costing American taxpayers an extra $50 billion in debt.


• REFORMS: Health care reforms will:


• Offer a real choice of plans to small businesses and Americans who lose their jobs or switch jobs.


• Provide tax credits to small businesses and individuals to make coverage affordable.


• End the practice of insurance companies denying coverage, where the big insurance companies place profits before people, and millions of people go without vital health care.


• Make investments in prevention, wellness, and patient-centered care.


• Give doctors and nurses the science-based information they need to provide the best, individualized treatments for their patients.


• Crack down on the waste, fraud, and abuse in the health care system and prevent insurers from passing on excessive administrative costs.


• BOTTOM LINE: Reforming health care to contain rising costs is the most effective action we can take to return our nation’s budget to balance and make our products and workers the most competitive in the world.

Please do not hesitate to contact me if I can help in any way, and rest assured I will keep working to make sure the federal government is fiscally responsible, accountable, and responsive to my constituents.

Thank you for the opportunity to represent you in Congress.