| FOR IMMEDIATE
RELEASE Tuesday, May 2, 2000 |
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Patients' Rights Coalition Leader Calls on Senator Nickles to Follow the Lead of His Own State
Statement by Judith L. Lichtman, President
National Partnership for
Women & Families
Sen. Don Nickles (R-OK) is so caught up in politics on Capitol Hill that he’s lost touch with the voters who put him there in the first place. Oklahoma Gov. Frank Keating recently signed a bill allowing citizens of his state to hold health plans accountable if they harm a patient. This common-sense legislation is a response to an urgent demand from the people of Oklahoma for strong patient protections -- the same kind of protections being stalled in Washington, DC by Oklahoma’s own Sen. Nickles.
Sen. Nickles leads the Congressional conference committee charged with sending a strong patients’ rights bill to President Clinton. After 9 weeks of meetings, the conference committee hasn’t even addressed the issue of holding health plans accountable when they harm a patient.
Oklahoma isn’t the only state trying to do what Congress won’t. Texas, Georgia, California, Arizona and Washington have passed accountability legislation because it’s what their citizens demanded. But, even with state laws in place, federal accountability is needed to provide protection for people in all health plans. Without corresponding changes in federal law, approximately 130 million people nationwide will be left without this essential right and remedy.
We need Congress to do its job, and to listen to the American people. Conference committee members should get moving and send a strong, enforceable patient protection bill to the President now.
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The National Partnership for Women & Families (formerly the Women’s Legal Defense Fund) is leading a coalition of patient and provider groups that support strong, enforceable patient protections. The National Partnership is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that promotes fairness in the workplace, quality health care, and policies that help women and men meet the dual demands of work and family.
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National Partnership for Women & Families.
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