NEW YORK NURSE: July/August 2007
by Nancy Webber
After the Oscar awards this spring, a nurse who has long supported universal heath care commented, “What we need is a movie that will do for this issue what An Inconvenient Truth did for global warming.”
Just two months later, the nurse got her wish. The June 29 release of SiCKO, a documentary by rabble-rousing director Michael Moore, prompted nationwide discussion about the serious problems with U.S. healthcare financing. Nurses in New York and across the country used the opportunity to inform the press and the public about the need for a single-payer, national health plan.
Moore evidently recognized that teaming up with nurses would add credibility to his message. He scheduled a sneak preview in California on June 12, co-sponsored by the California Nurses Association (CNA) and attended by labor leaders from across the nation. These included Verlia Brown, NYSNA president, and Harriet Cooper, an associate director in the association’s Economic & General Welfare (EGW) Program.
Moore gave 50 free tickets to NYSNA for the official June 18 premiere in Manhattan. The tickets were distributed to association member leaders. The film showing was preceded by a reception at the NYSNA offices on Wall Street and was attended by CNA officers, representatives from Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP), Health Care for All, and local labor leaders.
After the reception, about 100 nurses and physicians boarded buses for the trip uptown to the Ziegfeld Theatre. They gathered on the street, many wearing red SiCKO scrubs, to express their vocal support for healthcare reform. Inside the theater, nurses joined Moore onstage before the showing of the film.
Although the media seemed more interested in getting photos of celebrities on the red carpet, the nurses’ presence at the premiere was noted by CNN and Variety magazine. The next day, NYSNA CEO Tina Gerardi was interviewed on the Fox News Channel program The Big Story.
“The overall message of the film is that the U.S. ‘system’ is wasteful and unfair,” said Gerardi. “For more than 20 years, NYSNA and its members have been calling for universal access to quality, affordable care. Health care is a right, not a privilege.”
At NYSNA’s request, Moore and the Weinstein Company arranged a preview of SiCKO in Albany on June 27, which was attended by members of the local chapter of PNHP and the Capital District Alliance for Universal Healthcare. Staff from state regulatory agencies and local legislators braved a summer cloudburst to see the film.
NYSNA members Valerie Zito and John Hiltunin traveled on the “Scrubs for SiCKO” bus to Philadephia and Washington, D.C. following the New York City premiere. In an e-mail journal for the NYSNA Web site, Zito described participating in a Congressional hearing on H.R.676, a bill to establish a single-payer national health plan for all Americans.
“John Conyers [the bill’s sponsor] and members of the Black Caucus spoke in support of universal healthcare, with testimony from persons featured in the film,” Zito said. “Michael Moore acknowledged all nurses and noted that we are the foot soldiers for getting this passed, as we see these tragedies everyday. Maxine Waters and Dennis Kucinich applauded the nurses for their support and commitment to their patients.”
In response to a high level of interest among members on Long Island and in the Buffalo area, NYSNA purchased blocks of tickets for specific showings of SiCKO. The free tickets were given to NYSNA members to see the film at the Cinema Arts Centre in Huntington and the Amherst Theater in Buffalo on July 10. Members also distributed informational leaflets to their fellow theater-goers. The leaflet can be downloaded at www.nysna.org/sicko.