Mary Byrne
About a decade ago, Kimberley Connors, who was working as an archaeologist at the time, was diagnosed with breast cancer.
“Even with the amazing health care I had, the thing that I found out was when you get cancer, they send you to the financial aid office before you even have any kind of treatment plan,” she recalled. “I met people at Mass General (Hospital) who were working through both chemotherapy and radiation. They were so afraid of missing a day of work because they might lose their health care.”
Now eight years out of treatment and seven years in remission, Connors wants to change that reality for others.
“I changed my whole life,” she said. “I became a political activist.”
In January, Connors started as executive director of Massachusetts Campaign for Single-Payer Health Care (“Mass-Care”), where she is part of the team advocating for the passage of a bill touted by supporters as “improved Medicare for all.”
“Right now, the current patchwork system we have for health care has very little oversight,” she said.
According to Mass-Care, a single-payer health care system would cover everyone under a publicly financed insurance plan. Under this system — modeled after Canada’s — medical care would be free, and all doctors and hospitals would be accessible to any resident without the restrictions currently imposed by insurance companies, employers, and Medicare Advantage plans.
A single-payer plan would also eliminate premiums, co-pays, and deductibles.
In an email to The Voice, Jon Weissman, co-chair of Mass-Care, added that Section 12 of their proposed statute, An Act Establishing Medicare for All in Massachusetts, covers Massachusetts residents worldwide.
According to an explainer on the state website, funding the bill would involve creating a 7.5% employer payroll tax, a 2.5% employee payroll tax, and 10% each on unearned income and self-employed payroll tax — each with a $20,000 exemption.
Connors noted that the bill includes funding for job retraining for people whose jobs are impacted by the change.
Still, critics of the bill, which has died in committee every two years for the past 25 years, have concerns about the economic impact of a single-payer system.
In November, Belmont voters will be asked whether Rep. Dave Rogers should be instructed to vote for legislation to create a single-payer system of universal health care. The question, however, is non-binding and merely a way of polling the electorate as legislators prepare to re-file the legislation.
Belmont will be among the 11 districts to see the question on its ballot for the Nov. 5 election. For Belmont voters, it will be Question 6 on the ballot.
“We chose that district because Rep. Rogers is not a co-sponsor, yet the districts around him all are,” Connors said. “We typically do the ballot questions in districts where they are not co-sponsoring the bill … . It gets the conversation going between voters and the elected (representatives).”