Womenstake, NWLC's Blog

by Lisa Codispoti, Senior Advisor
National Women’s Law Center

This post is part of a weekly series on Women and Health Reform.

For me, like for many others, the fight for health reform is personal. While my own health challenges that I have faced for the last 25 years have always made me a health reform advocate, a close family member drove home that point for me again: last week, my sister was diagnosed with pre-cancerous breast tissue, which puts her at a greatly increased risk of developing an invasive, aggressive form of breast cancer.

During this incredibly difficult time, an emotional roller coaster of uncertainty amidst decisions she faces about her treatment options, I am hugely grateful for one important thing: my sister is lucky to have good, stable health insurance so that she can focus on the important decisions about her treatment — without having to worry about whether she can afford one option or another.

Sad to say, there are far too many others who face this and other health battles with an additional burden that no one should have to face: not having enough health coverage, or having no health coverage at all. Like a dear friend of my sister’s who faced her own breast cancer battle some years ago. She bore that very burden when her husband was laid off a month after her diagnosis, and faced losing her health coverage. Like the woman an oncologist told me about who came to her for cancer treatment with only $2,000 of health “coverage.” Like Houston janitor Ercilia Sandoval, who was uninsured because her employer didn’t provide health insurance, and who was diagnosed with advanced breast cancer a year after the onset of symptoms that should have taken her to the doctor — if she could have afforded to go.

by Julia Kaye, Program Assistant
National Women’s Law Center

Monday night’s State of the Union address felt strangely familiar. A president’s final year in office is typically a series of last-minute attempts to implement controversial policies, secure an attractive legacy and ensure the long-standing impact of his (or her) ideological agenda. As if the new make-up of the Supreme Court doesn’t already – ominously – promise that President Bush’s influence will last long past next January, his speech Monday night made it clear that this year will not, in fact, be the year in which the tradition of final-year partisan appointments and contentious regulations is broken.

The President’s address deserves a comprehensive analysis, though I will only touch upon the content here.  He began with an appeal to the Senate to avoid “the temptation…to load up the [stimulus] bill...which would only delay or derail it.” Yes – far be it for the Senate to “derail” the bill by adding in effective and just provisions targeted at the women and low- and moderate-income individuals and families who need them most, such as expanded unemployment benefits, increased food stamp benefits and a restoration of the funding cut from child support enforcement. The President went on to promise that the budget he will put forth next week “terminates or substantially reduces 151 wasteful or bloated programs, totaling more than $18 billion” – much like, presumably, the administration’s 2008 budget, which also helped relieve “bloated” programs…and in doing so, decreased access to health care, family planning services, child care and education, child support enforcement services, food assistance and education and training opportunities for low-income women and families.  Once again, he urged Congress to extend tax cuts that mostly benefit the very wealthy – and will cost the nation over $4 trillion over the next 10 years (stay tuned for an analysis of the 2009 budget!).

by Joan Entmacher, Vice President for Family Economic Security
National Women's Law Center