Erie Family Health Center

As you all know, tonight is Paint the Town Red, Erie’s event for our HIV/AIDS program, Lending Hands for Life. Well over 200 people will be in attendance this evening! As such, Health Beats is on hiatus for this week but we will return next week!

Also, stay tuned tomorrow as we live blog the President Obama’s bipartisan health care summit! Tune in starting at 9:00am for a play by play of the summit!

In the meantime, here’s a little Paint the Town Red inspiration:

Erie Family Health Center: PAINT THE TOWN RED from Erie Family Health Center on Vimeo.

Beats this week:

1) President Obama is planning a bipartisan summit on health care on February 25. Making the announcement during a pre-Super Bowl interview, Obama pledged that he wanted to work with Republicans to pass health care reform but would not agree to throw out the entire health care reform bill and start over.

2) As reported by Beats Per Minute last week, the First Lady Michelle Obama is leading an initiative to fight childhood obesity. The campaign, called “Let’s Move,” was kicked off this week.

3) Meanwhile, at the state level, the Illinois General Assembly allowed Governor Pat Quinn to delay sharing the details of his budget plan until March 10.  Many social service organizations across the state are bracing for another tough Spring and Summer of budget delays.

4) With health care reform stalled, hospitals nationwide continue to struggle as billions of dollars in medical bills go unpaid.

5) A study recently released by International Communications Research found that up to $9 billion could be raised for states with a $1 per pack tax on cigarettes. This report concluded that most Americans would support this increase over other tax increases or budget cuts.

When we think of the United States of America, there might be a few key pictures that enter our minds:  baseball, apple pie and…fast food?  Over the years, fast food has become associated with American culture.  Children especially have come to associate fast food with rewards, special days and celebrations.  Whether it is the fun toys, the play places or the mesmerizing advertisements, there is a certain spark about fast food that draws children in – and continues drawing them in through adulthood.

Courtesy of Huffington Post

Fast food, as well as the large variety of sugary and fattening junk food that adorns grocery store shelves, has played a large part in the child obesity epidemic witnessed over the years within the U.S.  It might come as a surprise, then, that a study recently released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Health Statistics found that child obesity rates have actually slowed in growth over the past several years. Despite these results, there is little reason to celebrate.  We still live in a nation where a third of our children are obese and in African American and Latino communities, the number reaches nearly 50%.

In the State of the Union Address given by President Obama last Wednesday, he mentioned a national movement to address the issue of childhood obesity, which will be led by the First Lady, Michelle Obama. Mrs. Obama recently announced her initiative to combat childhood obesity at the U.S. Conference of Mayors in Washington D.C., where she was discussing the issue.

(more…)

Like many community health center advocates around the country, I waited patiently during last night’s State of the Union speech for President Obama to discuss health care reform. All week I had heard many rumors about what would or would not be said about health care reform during this important speech. It was nearly 30 minutes and 3,000 words before I heard: “health insurance reform.” A sense of relief rushed over me: it was clear that the President was not abandoning his pledge to reform health care.

Courtesy of the Chicago Tribune

Packaging health reform with a slightly different name – health insurance reform – President Obama reaffirmed his commitment to passing health care reform legislation. “Here’s what I ask Congress, though: Don’t walk away from reform. Not now. Not when we are so close. Let us find a way to come together and finish the job for the American people. Let’s get it done,” said Obama. The President acknowledged that even as he was speaking, more individuals would go without health insurance and that Congress needed to take action to relieve the American people. (more…)

The plot thickens around health care reform! Check out these articles that discuss where health care reform goes from here:

1) Some still believe that despite a loss of the 60 vote majority in the Senate, President Obama can still achieve health care reform. It begins with a simple suggestion: “Obama should use his authority as president to start reforming the health care system right now.”

2) Conversely, others believe that the election in Massachusetts signaled the end of health care reform for the Obama administration.

3) Other experts claim that Obama can still utilize special procedural maneuvers to advance the health care bill. The move, known as budget reconciliation, would allow the bill to move through Congress with simply vote in the Senate. Read more in the New York Times.

4) Are you still confused about the differences between the House and Senate health care reform bills? Check out this breakdown of the health care proposals.

5) The Hill offers insight on the top ten reasons that health reform stalled.