Health Care Reform Activists to Stage Washington Park Rally and March to Federal Building

Rochester-area individual health care reform activists and groups will rally at Washington Square Park to demand that our federal officials implement Medicare for All health care reform.

A march to the Federal Building will follow, where empty prescription pill bottles, medical bills, and a petition will be delivered to Rep. Louise Slaughter to urge her to endorse HR 676: Expanded and Improved Medicare for All

On July 1, 2009, hundreds of Rochester-area individual health care activists and groups will rally at Washington Square Park to demand that our federal officials implement Medicare for All health care reform. The demonstration will begin at 3:30 PM.

The groups are protesting the status quo in American health care that excludes more than 48 million individuals, yet is by far the costliest in the world. In Washington Square Park, they will collect prescription pill bottles and bills from medical claims, representative of the current American health care delivery system that rations care through pricing. They will also gather petition signatures to ask Rep. Louise Slaughter to support HR 676, a bill currently before the House of Representatives that would implement Medicare for all Americans.

Immediately following the demonstration, cooperating individuals and groups will mobilize for a march from Washington Square Park to the Federal Building to deliver the prescription drug bottles, bills from medical claims, and a signed petition to Rep. Slaughter’s office. The concluding rally at the Federal Building Plaza will include individuals relating their travails with the current system of employment-based, for-profit health insurance coverage.

Groups supporting and coordinating the day’s efforts include Rochester for HR 676, the Rochester Interfaith Health Care Coalition, Physicians for a National Health Program, Students for a Democratic Society, Rochester Against War, and Progressive Democrats of Genesee Valley. Representatives for the sponsoring organizations will address rally participants during the Washington Square Park demonstration. The event is a means for the over twenty groups that sustain the area’s health care reform movement to demonstrate solidarity and promote meaningful reform for the United States’ health care funding and delivery mechanisms.

For more information about planned demonstrations and activities, visit: http://www.pdagv.org/Healthcare.html.
For more information about the sponsoring organizations, visit: http://www.grcc.org/health.html, www.rochesteragainstwar.org, www.pdagv.org.