Note: Senior Eunice How is one of the Uni High Activism Club members who helped to organize the group's health care reform panel discussion held Jan. 23. For Part 1 of our coverage, click here. To listen to comments made after the forum by Activism Club officer Shara Esbenshade, click the audio box at right. Audio was added Feb. 7.

ARE YOU THANKFUL for health insurance? It probably isn’t something you think about on a day-to-day basis, if you are blessed enough to have it. You get sick or hurt, and you go to the doctor. No big deal. But what about the 54,990 people who don’t have health insurance in Champaign County alone? What do they do?

For example, how would you feel if you were plagued with a painful, rotting tooth but couldn’t pay for a doctor, like the man I met last month? And how is the Champaign-Urbana community dealing with these critical issues?

These questions and more were discussed at “Transform: Health Care and the Local Movement for Reform,” a communitywide panel discussion held Jan. 23 at the Channing-Murray Foundation on campus. I was one of the Uni High Activism Club members who helped to organize and sponsor the panel along with Channing-Murray and the Illinois Disciples Foundation.

As I scanned the crowd gathered in the first-floor meeting room of the Channing-Murray building, a wave of relief swept over me. The two speakers I had contacted were there and ready to go.

More than 70 people showed up, more than we organizers had anticipated. At the doors, we even ran out of agendas to hand out!

Pastor Jeff Trask discusses health care reform at the Activism Club panel. Dr. David Hurley is in the background, Judith Ormazabal in the foreground.
Gargoyle photo by Deborah Ladd (click to enlarge)

I was happy that a lot of people, including a considerable number of Uni students, were interested in the subject and chose to come that night.

Jeff Trask started the program by discussing the issues that led him to found the Champaign County Christian Health Center. For instance, the Frances Nelson Community Health Center, which accepts patients who are uninsured, insured, or on Medicaid, had a waiting list in 2002-03, believe it or not, for a whole year!

The CCCHC provides holistic, free, and quality health care. Its mission is built on hope, with social workers and optional spiritual care on clinic nights. This is what is I love about the clinic — a low-pressure area where the friendly staff wants you to come back.

The health care system has become a business with maximum efficiency and expensive fees. Doctors are known to be rich, and that profession is apparently desired by schoolchildren, but for the wrong reasons.

Rob Scott, from the School for Designing a Society, mentioned that kids want to become doctors so they can buy the most expensive convertible, not because they want to care for their patients. Now that is really messed up.

Questions from the audience keep senior Shara Esbenshade busy during the Q&A phase of the panel discussion.
Gargoyle photo by Deborah Ladd (click to enlarge)

The term “health care” should imply a caring relationship between patient and doctor. Dr. David Hurley certainly feels that way.

Uncomfortable with the transaction-like atmosphere in the health business, he closed his plastic surgery practice and helped establish the Vermilion Area Community Health Center, a free clinic. It disgusted me when he mentioned that insured patients stopped paying their insurance because they were angry that part of their money was going toward paying for uninsured patients.

I bet you’re thinking, “Well, that’s fine and dandy that the system is messed up, but what can we, as lowly high school students, do?” Judith Ormazabal, an interpreter at the CCCHC, says that you can fight for the underrepresented. We are all part of the system, Americans and immigrants together.

There are two wonderful ways to get involved in this issue and volunteer your time and resources. Yes, even as a busy high school student!

The first is through the CCCHC. The staff running the clinics is almost entirely volunteer, with jobs ranging from providing primary care (doctors) to greeting patients and making sure they get where they need to be. I look forward to every night I am scheduled to do the latter jobs. Please talk to me if you are interested!

Another way to get involved is through the Champaign County Health Care Consumers. As explained by Claudia Lennhoff, the director, the organization focuses on community organizing and direct action, and you can help call our local politicians or write letters to our congressmen voicing your opinions.

Both of these volunteer opportunities don’t require any medical background or experience.

The choices made today will affect us, as adults, and our children. Together we can contribute to the solutions. Heal the care. Health care.

HOW YOU CAN HELP

• Volunteer: Both the Champaign County Christian Health Center and the Champaign County Health Care Consumers need volunteers, no experience required.
• Get informed: Know the facts about health care in America and in your own backyard. A good starting point: CCHCC's fact sheet about access to health care in Champaign County.
• Free your mind: Often the biggest obstacle to achieving constructive change is failure to see beyond the conventional wisdom. Want a new way of looking at things? Contact Rob Scott at the School for Designing a Society for advice on classes and readings.