Wednesday, August 19, 2009

Agudath Israel Weighs In on Health Care Reform (Updated)

Posted with permission of Agudath Israel
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Please Contact Rabbi Avi Shafran
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: August 19, 2009


Agudath Israel Weighs In on Health Care Reform

Orthodox Group Urges Respect for Religious Rights Of Patients, Providers, Employers


WASHINGTON, D.C. - Lauding the idea of universal health coverage but warning about the challenges that health care reform may pose in the realm of religious rights, Agudath Israel of America's Washington Office director and counsel, Rabbi Abba Cohen, laid out his organization's perspective in a letter addressed to President Barack Obama, and copied to Congressional leaders and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius.

The letter calls "universal coverage" a "worthy goal" and the fact that tens of millions of Americans reportedly have no health coverage "unacceptable." At the same time, it expresses concern that the cost-cutting measures designed to achieve universal coverage could result in diminished medical options for patients, and might undermine the centrality of the patient-doctor relationship.

Those concerns, according to Agudath Israel, must be considered in light of the fact that, for Orthodox Jews and millions of Americans of all faiths, "the preservation of life and the promotion of good health and well-being are religious imperatives." This insight, writes Rabbi Cohen, "adds an important new dimension to the debate over health care policy" - a debate that has taken center stage in the public arena as legislation seeking to overhaul health care in the United States is being considered by Congress.

The issue of religious rights, Rabbi Cohen writes, certainly bears impact on patient treatment. Agudath Israel is concerned that appropriate health care may not be provided in circumstances where "cost-benefit" analyses or judgments about "quality of life" may cause treatment to be denied; and asserts that treatment of the infirm must take into account patients' religious convictions.

Furthermore, the religious rights of health-care providers and private sector employers must also be respected, writes Rabbi Cohen. When medical personnel, for instance, are "called upon to perform medical procedures they consider religiously or morally objectionable" or "employers are told to provide coverage for such procedures," Agudath Israel asserts, their rights should be safeguarded.

Rabbi Chaim Dovid Zwiebel, Agudath Israel's executive vice president, noted the unique contribution the organization's letter makes to the ongoing national debate. "Discussion of the religious dimension of health care has been largely absent from the national dialogue," he says. "In reality, matters of life and death cannot be measured solely in dollars and cents; they no less need to be considered through the prism of religion and morality."

Below is the letter. Click on each of the pages to enlarge.

UPDATE: Wednesday morning Obama called on rabbis to help with health care reform:

President Barack Obama needs some outside help pushing health care reform, and he's turning to rabbis to get it.
In a morning conference call with about 1000 rabbis from across the nation, Obama asked for aid: "I am going to need your help in accomplishing necessary reform," the President told the group, according to Rabbi Jack Moline, who tweeted his way through the phoner.

"We are God's partners in matters of life and death," Obama went on to say, according to Moline's real-time stream.

The 15-minute morning briefing was sponsored by the Religion Action Center of Reform Judaism, and included rabbis of all persuasions. Although the RAC hosts the call each year, participants had never before heard from a sitting president.

Apparently, there was one glitch:

Eyebrows were also raised by the choice of hold music that played to rabbis before the call began.

"First mistake," Moline tweeted, as he waited for the call to begin. "Music on hold is 'Deutschland uber Alles,' " a classical German anthem, the lyrics to which in part say, "Preserve and protect our Kaiser, our land."

(The music was chosen by the company carrying the conference call, not the White House or the RAC.)

Read the whole thing.

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1 comment:

-suitepotato- said...

Tzedakah is what one gives of one's own will to another. We all know or should know what Rambam said about the subject and how he ordered the various types of tzedakah.

Expropriating the monies of some under threat of reprisal by the state, so that a small portion can be given to someone else, and the rest kept by those doing the expropriating, is not tzedakah.

Yet, that is exactly how our welfare and the new alleged healthcare system work. You have no choices. Your money is taken under duress against your will and some given to someone else and the majority kept by the system.

It is not tzedakah on your part because you did not choose to give, you did not choose of your free will to do good by someone else, you were compelled. Therefore no good can be ascribed to your act.

It is not tzedakah on the part of the government as the government essentially extorted the money out of someone else. In no way, shape or form are monies extorted rightfully yours, therefore they are not yours to give to another, therefore why you give them to another has no bearing.

The alleged health reform is nothing of the sort. Competition? The US Govt. can simply extort more money from the people in taxes and they have no choice but to pay or go to prison... or be made Treasury Secretary in Obama's administration. Some ethics there.

If my insurance company disappoints me, I have well over one hundred others I can go to. That is competition. If the US Govt. disappoints me, can I get a different US Govt.? No.

If the insurance company decides X and the US Govt. doesn't like it, the US Govt. can force them to do differently. Can the insurance companies force the US Govt. to do differently? No.

It is an inherently unequal relationship between a superior who has the police powers of the state and others who do not and live under the rules and at the mercy of the superior.

If one supports such things then either one would do such things oneself in which case one is a criminal, or one would not but would have others do it for them in which case one is a coward and a criminal.

Charity done in the community is done because one may or may not as one wills. It is that one is convinced that one should whether by religious dogma, or emotional appeal, or one's own conscience and then one chooses as one will on one's own.

This is not such a thing and is a crime and Obama merely wants to use Jews to say later on that he had the approval of Orthodox Jews, so if such religious morally conservative people are in favor of it, it must be right.

Judaism should not lend its good name to what is an unprecedented grab for power by the secular state to control the medical care of all those who live under it, giving the state one more thing to use as leverage against them, as one more thing to undermine the people's democratic will so that they will fear to act lest their medicines be withheld.

I rather doubt Maimonides would have thought the governments should stop him from practicing the healing arts and only allowed it on those they chose instead of all those he would have chosen to help of his own heart's conscience.