AFSCME Member's Fought Hard for Health Care Reform

Message from Council 24 Executive Director Martin Beil on behalf of AFSCME President McEntee:

President Obama recently signed the most significant piece of legislation in a generation. For the first time, our nation recognizes that health care is genuinely a right for all Americans. AFSCME members fought hard to pass President Obama’s health care reform package, and now it’s the law of the land. This victory will protect and improve good union health care benefits. It stops the worst abuses of the insurance companies. It gives workers and families without coverage on-the-job access to affordable health care. It ends skyrocketing premiums and caps on benefits. It helps seniors by closing the prescription drug donut hole, strengthening Medicare and helping employers pay for coverage of pre-Medicare retirees. It provides critical new funding to states.

AFSCME ran the largest mobilization campaign in our history to pass health care reform. More than 300,000 phone calls and letters were sent to Congress. We used texting and new media. We put ads on TV, online and in the papers. We marched, we lobbied and we prevailed.

Click on the title of this posting and you will find a thorough and factual summary of the health care reforms that are most important to AFSCME and its members. We hope you will use this educational tool to counter any misinformation currently circulating.

Thank you.