Healthcare reform panel

FOR: Ethical Culture Society of Bergen County and Bergen Grassroots

FROM: Eisenman-Todd / CONTACT: Paul Eisenman 201-692-9600

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Bergen County—There are many proposals for health care reform afloat these days—Senate and House committees alone have at least five—and two respected area physicians with varying views will discuss elements of their approaches at a forum on Tuesday, Oct. 27 at 7pm. The site is the Ethical Culture Society of Bergen County Meeting Hall, 687 Larch Avenue, Teaneck. The doors open at 6:45, the forum begins at 7pm and is scheduled to conclude at 9pm.

Ethical Culture and Bergen Grassroots, a good government reform group, are co-sponsoring the meeting. It features two physicians who have debated the health care reform issue numerous times throughout the greater NYC metropolitan area. Both have decades of medical practice experience and have been published numerous times.

Dr. Oliver Fein, a practicing general internist with experience in health policy, is President of Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP) and Chair of its New York Metro Chapter. This nationwide organization supports a Medicare-for-All (single-payer) system as the most efficient and economical form of health care reform. Among other things, Dr. Fein is currently Professor of Clinical Medicine and Clinical Public Health and Associate Dean at the Weill Cornell Medical College.

Richard H. Bernstein, MD, FACP is a medical director at the Visiting Nursing Service of New York and has been practicing general internal medicine for thirty years. Dr. Bernstein is an Associate Professor of Clinical Medicine and Clinical Community and Preventive Medicine at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine.

Joe Chuman, leader of the countywide Ethical Culture Society branch, will moderate the debate.

The physicians will flip a coin to determine who goes first. Each will have 20 minutes to present his reform position and each will have 5 minutes of response after the other’s presentation. The floor will then be thrown open for questions.

Bergen Grassroots, founded in 2005, meets regularly and publicly on the third Wednesday of each month at 7pm in the ECS auditorium. According to its statement of policy, Bergen Grassroots is a political activist group whose members include Republican and Democratic Party members as well as independents. Bergen Grassroots supports candidates for office, sponsors forums like this one to educate the public on political and social issues, engages people in the political process, and seeks to inform lawmakers and other officials at every level of government of its policies and platform.
The Ethical Culture Society of Bergen County, a welcoming humanist community and its Sunday School, meet at 11a.m. on Sundays at 687 Larch Avenue, Teaneck. For more information, call 201 836-5187 or visit www.EthicalFocus.org.