Uninsured veterans dying: a reminder of why we need health reform

We've been understandably focused on the details of health reform legislation: Will our benefits get taxed?  Will there be a public option?  What will premiums be?  Who will be eligible for coverage?  Of course, we need to think about these questions - it's important to get health reform right.  But it's also worth remembering why we need health reform in the first place.

More than 2,000 veterans died last year because they didn't have health insurance, according to new estimates from Harvard researchers released for Veterans' Day.

Using Census Bureau survey data, the researchers, Dr. Steffie Woolhandler and Dr.  David Himmelstein, professors at Harvard's medical school, estimated there are nearly 1.5 million veterans under the Medicare age of 65 who are uninsured and who aren't getting care from VA treatment programs.

Citing an earlier study that being uninsured increases the chance of death by 40%, they estimate that 2,266 veterans died last year because they didn't have insurance.  That is, as they point out, "14 times the number of deaths (155) suffered by U.S. troops in Afghanistan in 2008, and more than twice as many as have died (911 as of Oct. 31) since the war began in 2001."

"Like other uninsured Americans, most uninsured vets are working people - too poor to afford private coverage but not poor enough to qualify for Medicaid or means-tested VA care," .  Woolhandler said. "As a result, veterans go without the care they need every day in the U.S., and thousands die each year. It's a disgrace."

Health reform, such as H.R. 3962, just passed by the House, would make coverage more available to veterans and other uninsured working people by providing subsidies for moderate-income workers and by preventing insurance companies from denying coverage or jacking up premiums because of pre-existing medical conditions.