Ohio Union members travel to washington, d.c. to rally for real health care reform for all americans

Ohio AFL-CIO President Joe Rugola, speaks to several hundred union sisters and brothers who made their way to Washington, DC to rally for health care reform.

Seven buses left from different times of the day and from all over Ohio to converge in the nation’s capital to join over 10,000 other Americans who want real healthcare reform. The event, sponsored by the Health Care For America NOW! (HCAN), was dominated by labor from across the country as working women and men gathered to urge Congress to join President Barack Obama to make health care a right, not a privilege.

For Ohio’s working families, the morning started at 8:30am at the AFL-CIO building as Congresspersons Marcia Fudge and Betty Sutton joined speakers like Ohio AFL-CIO President Joe Rugola to ramp up members both with motivation and caffeine from the free coffee. Sutton summed up the reason for so many Ohioans making the trip, “I am glad to see so many people here today because although I am with you, we need all of Congress to know how many people are wanting real health care reform.”

From there, the seven Ohio buses made the way to Senate Park, just outside the Capitol building, and joined the thousands of other sisters, brothers and community activists that assembled on the lawn to hear from the many speakers. Perhaps the most notable was actress Edie Falco from The Sopranos, who gave a personal account of her struggles navigating the current health care system, reminding everyone that it is not only the uninsured that need real reform as well.
"I work in a business where they take great care of you if you are working," Falco, a breast cancer survivor, told the crowd. "It's bad enough the emotional impact of not having a job," she said. "But to get sick on top of that, and worry every day that your symptoms are not getting better, figuring out what you're gonna have to do without so you can afford a doctor's visit — I am far more familiar with that than I am with my situation these last number of years. I’m here because I’ve traveled through the health care system and there are some holes. I’m here because I care about the people in this country and I know that we can do better, that we must do better.”

Also speaking was Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown, who has always been up front about helping all working families both on the job and at home. Sen. Brown told the crowd that he’d just left a health insurance markup session on the hill, and instructed them: “Go across the street and convince, persuade and cajole” lawmakers to get “a strong public option and real health care reform. Reform is about keeping what works and fixing what’s broken.” Brown also let it be known that real reform will not happen without the work of everyone. ““The private health care industry will not hijack this process,” Brown said. “We’re counting on you…to persuade, to cajole, to do whatever you do to get a public option.”
After the rally, hundreds of Ohioans marched to Union Station for a town hall meeting in the Columbus Club. Here Ohioans heard from those in their own state about what health care reform will meant to them.

"It is unacceptable for a person to choose between food and medicine," Leondra Barrett, a single mom from Columbus, told the group. "It is unacceptable that people are literally dying of lack of adequate health care because they do not have insurance.

Tim Burga, Chief of Staff of the Ohio AFL-CIO also spoke at the town hall meeting advising everyone that the time is now for reform to take place in America.
“We cannot wait one more year, one more month or one more week. The health and well being of our people is at stake and our businesses cannot compete internationally with this system in place. The time to overhaul our health care system is now. The only way to control costs and increase access is to have a public insurance option in place and to make employers pay their fair share,” Burga said.
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Seven busloads of Ohio union activists joined with over 10,000 other activists for real health care reform.