Tuesday was on-campus day. There was a panel presentation and discussion on Morehouse campus. The panelist included: Dr. Alice Demi, Director of the School of Nursing Georgia State University; Daniel Blumenthal, MD from Morehouse Medical School; Nigel Harris, MD, DM, Dean and VP for Academic Affairs at Morehouse School of Medicine.; Bradley Herring, PhD, assistant professor in the department of Health Policy and Management at the Rollin School of Public Health at Emory University and Louis Sullivan, MD the founding  Dean and first president of Morehouse School of Medicine.  Again a great discussion about issues pertaining to the uninsured. GNA was represented at this event.

The activity for Wednesday was health fair day. The health fair was held at West-End Mall. There were over 30 booths. Nursing was represented by booths from GNA and Georgia State University.  Thanks to Mary Mallison, RN and Carla Keplinger RN for providing coverage for this booth from 11-7 on this date. Brochures on” Everyone deserves a nurse” were given out and blood pressures were taken. Student nurses assisted with the activities. Also Barbara Browning, JoAnn Bacon and Eva Horne assisted with both GNA and GSU tables. There was a lot of activity at the tables with many individuals sharing stories of being uninsured.

Thursday was an event to bring business and labor together for a discussion. There were many interfaith activities scheduled from Friday morning (3/14) until 3/16.  Again this was a very exciting week with much collaboration among agencies and organization

There are reasons why insurance matters. They include: 1) the uninsured are less likely to have a usual source of care outside the emergency room; 2) the uninsured often go without screenings and preventive care; 3) the uninsured often delay of forgo needed medical care; 4) the uninsured are often subject to avoidable hospital stays; 5) uninsured Americans are sicker and die earlier than those who have insurance; and 6) medical care is more costly for the uninsured than for insured Americans. The uninsured are often charged more for health services than people with insurance. Major insurers, including Medicare and Medicaid, negotiate big discounts with hospitals and other providers that are not available to the uninsured.

Other factors noted in the 2001 U.S. Census Bureau statistic is that the uninsured children miss more days of school and uninsured workers miss more days from work. There were three primary reasons people employed in December 2002 have gone without insurance. They were: 1) all jobs did not offer health insurance benefits; 2) even if employers offer coverage, the employee cannot afford to pay their share of the premium; and 3) temporary job loss due to layoffs, job elimination, or worker choice.

It is wonderful to have a neutral foundation such as Robert Wood Johnson and other foundations and national organizations bring legislators, professional organizations, labor, business and churches together to discuss the problems that exist with the over 41 million uninsured in the US. This week was successful in creating awareness of the uninsured problem in the US and Georgia. Throughout the week there were 67 Town Hall Meetings, 71 On-Campus Activities, 262 Health Fairs, 39 Business and Labor Forums and 57 Interfaith Events.

This is great to create awareness but many are asking about solutions. There were solutions discussed during these activities but the purpose of the “Cover the Uninsured Week” was awareness and education. There is a group “The Governors Healthcare Coverage Project” who collected the statistics in Georgia and now is looking for possible solutions to the problem of the uninsured. I represent GNA on the group.

The plight of the uninsured is vast. It took 41 million Americans “to get business and labor” on the same side of an issue.  Most of the uninsured are working but cannot afford insurance. In the future, the number of individuals is likely to increase unless we can continue this interest and focus on healthcare coverage that is affordable and assessable to all citizens.