What is the Healthcare is a Human Right Campaign?
The Healthcare Is a Human Right Campaign, a project of the Vermont Workers’ Center (VWC), aims to change what is "politically possible" in healthcare reform through grassroots organizing and a strategic reframing of healthcare as a basic human right and the healthcare crisis as a human rights emergency.
What do you mean when you say that healthcare is a human right?
We believe that:
1. Every person is entitled to comprehensive, quality healthcare.
2. Systemic barriers must not prevent people from accessing necessary healthcare.
3. The cost of financing the healthcare system must be shared equitably.
4. The healthcare system must be transparent in design, efficient in operation and accountable to the people its serves.
5. As a human right, the healthcare system that satisfies these principles is the responsibility of the government to ensure.
Why is healthcare so important?
Healthcare is the civil rights movement of our time. Since launching our Healthcare is a Human Right Campaign in the winter of 2008, we have discovered that Vermonters refuse to stand by as the human rights of her people continue to be violated by a system that profits off the pain of others. We know that Vermont is ready to lead the nation in this historic fight, now we need your help to make good on this potential.
What are you trying to do?
Our long-term goal is a universal system in which healthcare is recognized as a public good and provided collectively, rather than as a commodity sold in a marketplace, and where the human right to health of all residents of the state is fully recognized, regardless of race, gender or gender identity, ability, sexual orientation, nationality or immigration status. Financing must be based on principles of universality, equity, and social solidarity, such as a single-payer system.
We want a healthcare system where everyone gets the medical care that they need without worrying about how they'll pay for it. No more private insurance companies price-gouging their clients for plans that cover nothing, no more personal bankruptcies from medical debt, and no more Vermonters living without medical care.
That sounds great! What can I do to help?
We can definitely use all the help we can get. Click here to visit our page on getting involved.
Okay! Anything else?
This campaign is supported by the National Economic and Social Rights Initiative and we work in collaboration with Vermont Citizens Campaign For Health and Vermont For Single Payer.