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Share ThisJul 24, 2008
Southtown Star - Ozinga ought to ask, ‘What would Jesus do?’
Politicians. Candidates. Human beings. Sometimes, we say stupid things.
I'm counting 11th Congressional District candidate Marty Ozinga's feebleminded health-care quote among them.
In a recent cable television interview, Ozinga was asked what should be done about the uninsured. As someone who co-founded a medical clinic in Romania and visited AIDS-ravaged Africa, Ozinga knows firsthand the need for quality care. Yet he gave an ignorant answer about health care in the United States: "There are very few people nowadays that have no health service at all," Ozinga said. "Almost anybody - I don't care who you are - you go to the hospital and you get taken care of."
The interviewer interrupted him with a question about emergency rooms, so Ozinga didn't get a chance to complete the thought.
But during the rest of the interview, Ozinga outlined his position, which mirrors that of Republicans nationally. He opposes a government-run health care system but believes Congress should expand accessibility with small-business incentives. Congress could create or expand tax deductions for individuals whose employers don't provide coverage.
He also supports caps on medical malpractice claims and importing cheaper prescription drugs.
Trouble is, Republicans have been squawking about these same ideas for a decade, and guess what? Nothing has changed. Meanwhile, candidates like Ozinga - who calls himself a God-fearing conservative - trust the market to eventually correct the problem.
I think we're way beyond that.
No guarantees
Not only are hospitals and physicians demanding government intervention because of the demands on their emergency rooms, Americans are going broke over health-care costs.
Insurance companies are looking for ways to deny treatments. Physicians are refusing to accept patients with certain health-care plans because they're fed up with nonsense in the insurance industry. Hospitals are closing in lower-income communities - St. Francis in Blue Island almost was one example - and opening high-end facilities where the clientele is more appealing - Silver Cross' move to New Lenox, for example.
This is not the way Jesus, whom Ozinga often references, delivered health care.
"He touches the leper (Mark 1:41), lays hands on the blind man (Mark 8:22), and takes the hand of the daughter of Jairus (Luke 8:54). His touch seems to say to them in their wretchedness and isolation: 'You are worthwhile. Through God's loving touch, you are whole. I am with you,' " explains the Western Catholic Report newsletter.
Nowadays, even if you can afford to buy health insurance, you aren't guaranteed coverage. Insurance companies are denying policies to young, healthy individuals for things like acne. Tax deductions aren't going to fix that.
Ozinga's remark was particularly baffling because he is no stranger to the tragic realities of living without health care. He is a longtime participant in Medical Missions, a group of volunteer doctors and businessmen who partner to provide on-the-ground care in the most impoverished areas of the world.
"He went with me in the early 1990s to Africa," said Dr. Alex DeJong, who runs an Orland Park-based medical practice. "We lived in a guest house with no running water. We bathed in a bowl and carried water up a hill for a week. We're lifers. We're involved. We just feel a calling to do it. To us, involved means going there."
Ozinga also co-founded a clinic in Romania, the Dr. Luca Medical Center, that fulfills his Christian principles of overlapping God's work with health care for the poor. In announcing his candidacy for the 11th District, Ozinga said his primary goal was to "honor and glorify God" and "be of service to the crown ofhis creation, our fellow man."
People are dying
I hate to break it to him, but our fellow man is dying on the floors of emergency rooms and getting dumped at homeless shelters by overwhelmed hospital staff.
Example: Esmin Green, who died July 2 in the emergency room of a New York City hospital after waiting 24 hours for a bed to open up.
Example: Gabino Olvera, a 42-year-old paraplegic dumped by overwhelmed hospital staff outside a homeless shelter in Los Angeles, where he sat in a dirty hospital gown with his catheter still attached until someone from the shelter noticed him.
Example: Cyril Strezo, of Frankfort, who turned to this very newspaper when his insurance company denied chemotherapy treatment. He died in March.
I realize these are incendiary incidents.
But something has gone terribly wrong in America when these situations occur and don't spur swift, dramatic change among lawmakers in Washington. Tax incentives and bulk purchasing of prescription drugs are good ideas, but they aren't going to fix the very complex problems of profit-driven health care.
Ozinga knows how expensive our system has become. His company pays more than $10 million annually for health insurance for 600 unionized employees and about 135 nonunion workers, according to his campaign.
No, Ozinga isn't a ruthless CEO.
Maybe he just needs to dust off that Bible.
"The whole multitude sought to touch Him; (and He) healed them all." (Luke 6:19)
