Catamount Tavern News Service -This summer, volunteers and staff from the Vermont Workers' Center have been asking working Vermonters a simple question — "Do you believe we have a human right to healthcare?"
That question is part of a survey being conducted as the first phase of the Workers' Center's Healthcare Is a Human Right campaign. This campaign aims to change what is "politically possible" in the healthcare debate through grassroots organizing and expanding public understanding of the human rights framework.
Catamount Tavern News Service, Burlington, VT - This summer, volunteers and staff from the Vermont Workers' Center have been asking working Vermonters a simple question — "Do you believe we have a human right to healthcare?"
That question is part of a survey being conducted as the first phase of the Workers' Center's Healthcare Is a Human Right campaign. This campaign aims to change what is "politically possible" in the healthcare debate through grassroots organizing and expanding public understanding of the human rights framework. "Sixty years ago, in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the nations of the world — including the U.S. — declared that everyone has a basic human right to medical care and security in the event of sickness or disability," said Dawn Stanger, president of the Workers'Center. "Sadly, that right is not respected in the U.S., the wealthiest country in the world."

So far, the Center has surveyed over four hundred Vermonters, with a goal of reaching well over a thousand this fall. Some of the survey results have been eye-openers. Approximately two-thirds of respondents had refrained from getting health care at some point because they felt they were unable to afford it. A majority have stayed in a job only because of health insurance benefits. Almost one in five have experienced discrimination in trying to access healthcare, and more than one in ten respondents have stayed in an abusive relationship in order not to lose health benefits.

Surveys are being collected door-to-door, in workplaces, at community events and house parties hosted by volunteers. "The effort is really to try to speak to people who haven't been involved in politics before," said Colin Robinson of the Vermont Livable Wage Campaign, which is joining the Workers' Center in the campaign.

The next stage of the campaign will feature Human Rights Hearings in locations around the state in the fall, where community leaders will gather to hear testimony from those most affected by the healthcare crisis: working Vermonters, the unemployed, retirees, the un- and under-insured. The Workers' Center expects to hold hearings in Brattleboro, Burlington, Barre and the Northeast Kingdom in the coming months, expanding to more locations as the campaign continues.

"The start of organizing for the Healthcare is a Human Right campaign has been exciting and inspiring this summer," says Erik Kojola of Burlington, one of the intern organizers and active participants on the campaign."Folks have been extremely supportive and I have gotten a sense that people are ready for change in the healthcare system."

"The campaign has been extremely rewarding to work with; it shows that the vast majority of Vermonters are in agreement about the importance of a universal health care system and the necessity of changing our current system," says Katt Tolman, another intern organizer on the campaign, and is of Albany, Vermont.

For more information about the campaign, to volunteer or take the survey, contact VWC Healthcare Organizer Erika Simard at 861-2877 (Burlington) or 866-229-0009 (toll-free), or visit workerscenter.org/healthcare

James Haslam
Director
Vermont Workers' Center
294 North Winooski Avenue
Burlington, VT 05401
james (at) workerscenter.org
www.workerscenter.org
802-272-0882
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HEALTHCARE IS A HUMAN RIGHT!
The VWC is committed to building a movement to change what's politically
possible for healthcare in VT. Find out how you can help, email
healthcare (at) workerscenter.org or see www.workerscenter.org/healthcare

"Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most
shocking and inhumane." Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.