For me, a child of the 1980s, Patrick Swayze’s name will always conjure that magical moment in “Dirty Dancing” when be growls “no one puts Baby in a corner” and whisks Jennifer Grey (a nice Jewish girl) onto the stage. Captured then in his youth and grace, it seems all the more shocking that he has left us after a prolonged battle with cancer.
My aunt and grandfather lost their battles with cancer, too. Like Swayze, they did not have to choose between paying the mortgage and paying medical bills. To get or keep health care coverage, they did not have to work in a hazardous job. They did not have to wait through the night in a field to enter a tent filled with doctors who were providing people with the first medical care they had received in years.
In his address to the nation, President Obama labeled the call to reform our health care system a “moral issue.” Quoting the late Senator Ted Kennedy, the president said the road forward depends on “fundamental principles of social justice and the character of our country,” not just the details of health care policy.
Fundamental principles of social justice and character are the essence of our spiritual journey on Yom Kippur. For a day, we face our own death. Called to account, we stand as a community and chant the vidui, the confession, in the plural voice: “We have transgressed, we have done violence, we have lied, we have oppressed, we have led others astray, we have strayed from Your good precepts and ordinances, and it has not profited us.” Collectively, we bear responsibility for our neighbor’s vices and well-being. We are woven together in a single cloth and return to life through that bond of common welfare.
We are not God. We do not know who among us will live and who will die. We know only that we bear collective responsibility for building a just and holy community — a kehillah kedoshah — a world as best repaired from its wounds as we can achieve, together.
Jewish tradition teaches us that a kehillah kedoshah cares for the sick. As Jews, we visit and feed those who have fallen ill. The Amidah praises God as one “who supports the ones falling, heals the sick, and releases the imprisoned.” The Talmud teaches: “It was said in the name of Rav: It is forbidden to live in a town that has no doctor.” According to Maimonides, the minimum requirements for a society appropriate to house a Torah sage include medical care.
The Talmud also teaches us that the way in which we ask our community to pay for health care is as much a part of its moral import as the provision of care itself. In Tractate Ta’anit 21b, a bloodletter (the physician of antiquity) cuts a slot in the back of his home, allowing his patients to pay anonymously after they have received treatment. The doctor, unaware of who pays and how much, treats all equally — whatever the patient’s class, age, gender, or race. (In “Dirty Dancing,” Jennifer Grey’s father, a Jewish doctor, provides free emergency medical care to a young female dancer in need.)
Knowing our tradition, how will we address the wound that is our nation’s failure to provide comprehensive, secure medical care for those in need, with pre-existing conditions, and without employment?
There is no magic bullet, no easy answer for what combination of policies will help us start to solve America’s health-care crisis. But we must address it. As it is said in Pirkei Avot: “We are not required to finish the work, nor are we free to desist from it.”
Elissa D. Barrett is executive director of Progressive Jewish Alliance.
Fine. But lets fix only what needs to be fixed, not degrade or destroy the most advanced healthcare on earth, that almost all Americans are happy with and want to keep. There is a leftist totalitarian effort ("Obamacare") to nationalize and ration healthcare which Jews need to morally resist.
No, no, no, Frank. Far from having the most advanced healthcare on earth, we are far behind other industrialized nations both in life expectancy and infant mortality. A CBS poll (see LA Times, Sept 24) shows that 82% of respondents want thorough going reform of our health care system. No-one, including President Obama, is advocating nationalizing health care, which will continue to be delivered privately. The discussion is about financing health care and how that will be divided between individuals, employers and the government. Healthcare is rationed now by insurance companies. The choice is not between rationing and no rationing. The issue is how rationing will be done, and by whom.
Thank you, Elissa, for speaking out Jewishly on this issue.
i appreciate you talking about this issue, but as a progressive organization we need to be specific as to what we favor. the democratic plans are not health care reform; single payer is health care reform. it is not enough to talk in generalities. in fact, support of any of the democratic plans, including the so-called public option does not really fix the system. the bacus plan would be a boon for the insurance industry. by failing to talk about single payer as the most cost effective way to provide true health care reform, we allow the right and obama to fight over a plan that will most likely be very costly and ineffective. the nature of health care reform does matter and we need to be clear as to what it should be rather than talk in generalities. unfortunately, i think obama has blown the opportunity for real health care reform and while he may claim a victory when the democrats pass some waterdowned version of health insurance reform we will be stuck with a system that still does not work and generates private profits at the expense of patients and health care providers.
Frank -Although one may be able to argue that the most advanced healthcare is available in the United States, what we have is the most inefficient and inequitable system for providing access to healthcare among industrialized nations. Healthcare is already rationed - based on who can pay for it, with the decisions being made by private insurance companies who are accountable not to their policy holders, but to their stockholders who are only concerned about profits generated by denying care. I agree with Bob that only a single-payer system would be real reform, and President Obama has even admitted that if we were building a health care system from scratch it would be single-payer. Two-thirds of Americans want at least a public option, and so do two-thirds of doctors. The only reason we do not have a single-payer system is the more than $1 million a day the health insurance and pharmaceutical industry is paying daily from the premiums they collect from you and me to lobbyists in Congress (more than 2 lobbyists for every member of Congress), as well as millions in campaign contributions.
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