Blog #22 POST 'Rally To Congress' Washington D.C.
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- Written by: Super User
Update: And it gets worse: KIDS!!!!
Petition (and see our visit to DC and DC Press Conference + Rally)
There were 'Winds of Change' in D.C.'s hallways of Congress this last February 29th, 2024 - both figuratively and literally! It was quite blustery both inside and out - but that is pretty much a constant on the inside. But we added something not always seen - we spoke the truth! We spoke the truth with our stories outside the Capitol building! We spoke the truth inside the hallways and rooms of Congress at both @RepMaxineWaters' conference room and outside @RepJasonCrow's office! We thank you both for helping to lead this effort! And thanks to so many of our Congress people, the huge labor union SEIU, NYT's best-selling author Tom Mueller, and Dr. Rhonda Hamilton for their efforts at the January 31st Press Conference in front of so many of our Congressional leaders! It was an excellent Press Conference from all indications. Dr. Hamilton also led us this February 29th!
I'll ask, could this be an issue that could unite the parties? (bear with me) The old-school Dems over the years have been perceived by some as caring about quality of care and workers' rights - and have recognized we all need a little help now and then. The old-school Republicans on the other hand were at one time thought to be in favor of local control, picking themselves up by the bootstraps, and fiscal conservatism - all qualities that have been severely lacking in kidney dialysis!
How so? This writer could see many old-school Republicans in favor of things like local small clinics which would be much more manageable than the current Goliath big two scandal-ridden dialysis companies who fight any type of reform at every turn - and have the big bucks to shout down any opposition!
Old-school Republicans are also known to preach about picking-yourself-up-by-the-bootstraps. (haven't always practiced what they preached) What is more 'picking yourself up' than home dialysis where self-care is emphasized? Which leads to fiscal conservatism. At home, patients don't need a clinic's building surrounding them or staff helping them out - a big cost savings!
The old-school Dems on the other hand might point out there are going to be people who are in too bad of shape to ever qualify for home dialysis and clinics are always going to be needed - and there are people who just don't want the hassle for one reason or another. Choice needs to be a factor in all this! And those in clinics deserve staff that is well-trained and not worked to death with improper staff to patient ratios!
So what is the holdup if this is a bipartisan issue? As mentioned the dialysis companies will fight tooth and nail any attempt they see as a threat to their assembly-line treatments - get them in and out as fast as you can and get paid (out the wazoo). A big wall of money is going to try to stop things like innovations that would threaten management's big bonuses! Innovations like 'Community Dialysis Houses' where many dialysis patients who are perfectly capable of self-care, but for whatever reason can't do home dialysis, can do their own treatments with minimal help. This also saves the system money. However the big dialysis companies would lose "customers" so it shouldn't be surprising they just might be against it. And nephrologists, kidney doctors, might not be inclined to recommend such places. They might not have a financial interest in 'Community Dialysis Houses' and would have less of an incentive to recommend them. Which leads to another big need in this field of medicine - the elimination of the nephrologists' exemption to the 'Stark Law' which stops doctors from profiting off their patients! Neprologists need to stop seeing their patients as cash cows, they need to see them as people who deserve the best treatment possible!
It is time to "Undo Big Dialysis"!!!
Petition (and see our visit to DC and DC Press Conference + Rally)
Blog #21 A Knife Point into the Heart of Monopoly Power - Kidney Dialysis
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- Written by: Super User
Update: And it gets worse: KIDS!!!!
Petition (and see our visit to DC and DC Press Conference + Rally)
The last of the Zoom meetings before the big February 29th 'Rally To Congress' was completed yesterday (02/08/2024)! It was an excellent meeting that got many of us fired up! Fired up for the DC Rally on February 29th starting at 10am - click on this link for details, includes: how to order a T-shirt, an 'Eventbrite Registration Link', and our 'Congressional "Dialysis" Call To Action'! We are ready to call out what has to be the worst abuse of monopoly power imaginable! (if you missed the red highlighted link above, here it is again) Want more of an intro to all this? This writer is thinking of you dear reader. Here is a 'Reading List' that includes everything from a one minute intro, a starting article, and 5 books - everything from kidney dialysis to the ill effects of monopoly power are covered. Kidney dialysis has to be an extreme example of what happens when 'choice' is taken out of the equation!
This is being headed up by people like Dr. Rhonda Hamilton of the Washington D.C. organization 'M.I.Mother's Keeper' and DC mayoral candidate, NYT's best-selling author Tom Mueller (recent book 'How to Make a Killing' is about dialysis'), and the huge labor union SEIU. Already this January 31st a Press Conference was held in DC at the capitol. Dr. Hamilton, people from SEIU, and author Tom Mueller were all there. Here is Tom Mueller's testimony.
We've already gotten the attention of many of our federal reps. It looks like people like @RepMaxineWaters, @RepKatiePorter, @RepAdamSchiff, and @RepZoeLofgren have already been laying into the big two for-profit dialysis companies (DaVita and Fresenius) at places like the January 31st Press Conference mentioned. Senators @ChuckGrassley, @SenatorRonWyden, @SenBlumenthal, @SenatorShaheen, @SenatorHassan and Representatives @RepDelBene, @RepLarryBucshon, and @RepChrisPappas have all shown an interest in this.
Add into the mix now Representative @JasonCrowCO. He is my Rep from Colorado. I was informed at the Zoom meeting he has been in contact with Dr. Rhonda Hamilton of M.I. Mother's Keeper. I look forward to meeting him when I'm in DC. Having been an Army Ranger, it looks like he has already been working on a good number one rule for warfare: 'DON'T KILL KIDS'. I just saw this post by him. Possibly this could also be a number one rule in healthcare - have I mentioned this?
This could be the biggest thing in Kidney Dialysis since the 2000 US Senate Hearings - not to mention a huge blow against monopoly power! (and could this be a bipartisan issue?)
Petition (and see our visit to DC and DC Press Conference + Rally)
A Reading List to get up to Speed
Blog #20 Washington D.C.'s M.I. Mother's Keeper - Press Release
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- Written by: Super User
Update: And it gets worse: KIDS!!!!
Petition (and see our visit to DC and DC Press Conference + Rally)
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
January 30, 2024 3PM (EST)
CONTACT:
Dr. Rhonda Hamilton - (240) 274-9436,
Cynthia Robinson – (301) 768-2101
(WASHINGTON, DC) Healthy DC & Me Leadership Coalition grassroots are mobilizing 1,000 supporters and citizens of “Dialysis” to “Rally to Congress” to seek accountability from congressional legislators for “Big Dialysis” harmful industry practices that are negatively impacting American citizens’ physical and mental health daily. The Coalition will meet with U.S. Representative Maxine Waters’ office to discuss requested Dialysis industry healthcare reforms.
As SEIU-United Healthcare Workers West are traveling from California to Washington, D.C. along with Dialysis caregivers working at Fresenius, (the largest provider of dialysis services to the Federal government and since 2014, and has received more than $2 billion in revenue from contracts with the Veterans Administration (VA) for outpatient dialysis), to urge Congress and the Biden Administration to investigate Fresenius’ labor law violations and retaliatory practices.
Healthy DC Leadership officials are pleased to welcome to the Nation’s Capital, their ally in the fight to save lives of “Dialysis”, Investigative journalist Tom Mueller, author of the dialysis exposé How to Make a Killing: Blood, Death, and Dollars in American Medicine.
Mr. Mueller joins Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren and members of the California delegation at 2318 Rayburn House Office Building, on January 31, 2024 at 10:00AM. Mr. Mueller’s in-depth reporting and portrayal of the indignities suffered by patients of Dialysis, along with his support of the countless workers and advocates who continue to fight for industry reform, and the dissolution of “Big Dialysis” practices have contributed to the formation of Healthy DC & Me Leadership Coalition’s “Black History Month”, “Rally to Congress”!
Thursday, February 29, 2024 at 10:00AM on Capitol Hill, Union Square, Area 15,(bounded by Pennsylvania Avenue, NW; First Street, NW/SW; Maryland Avenue, SW; and Third Street, SW/NW), activist, advocates, care givers, professionals, individuals, families, citizens, and supporters of Dialysis will all convene on the “Hill” in a resounding display of cultural, citizenry, familial, constituency, humanitarian, and American spirit to call for reform in the Dialysis healthcare industry, the immediate removal of trauma imposed, and dangerous mental health exposures for all individuals and families, and most especially African Americans, who are disproportionately impacted with kidney failure, racial disparities, and discriminatory health outcomes.
U.S. dialysis care is dominated by Fresenius and DaVita, two multi-billion-dollar corporations. Since 2014, the VA has awarded DaVita contracts worth approximately $1.5 billion for outpatient dialysis services.
American citizens of Dialysis are dying! Under-served communities, heavily populated by African American citizens are under siege from the “Big Dialysis” practices of these two industry duopolies. DaVita & Fresenius have been repeatedly accused by prosecutors and whistleblowers of Medicare fraud, kickbacks, patient harm, death, bribery under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, & other wrongdoing.
Join the Healthy DC & Me Leadership Coalition in the fight to save lives of “Dialysis”! On February 29, 2024 at 10:00AM on Capitol Hill! The Time Has Come, “Big Dialysis” Must Be Undone!
For more information: www.mitv.fyi --- https://youtu.be/J9KxVDi2X7c
Petition (and see our visit to DC and DC Press Conference + Rally)
Blog #19 Just a Couple of Guys from the Neighborhood - Can They Make a Deal?
- Details
- Written by: Super User
Update: And it gets worse: KIDS!!!!
Petition (and see our visit to DC and DC Press Conference + Rally)
This writer re-gifted himself an old toy he made new for the holiday season - an old X (formerly twitter) account and now renamed @BreakUpDaVita! There was hesitation at first to dive in after hearing about X's Wild West reputation - but then it was remembered this writer loves that sort of thing! (who have I been kidding) Slow inroads have been made with a few followers and I've met a lot of friendly people - especially young ladies who want to be my friend! (darn animal magnetism gets this old grandpa in trouble every time) Sorry ladies, I'm spoken for so I had to block you! (and a lot of that behavior wasn't very ladylike)
However there was one follower who was quite interesting @elonmusk_1fan. After dealing with the "friendly" ladies and years of following the antics of people like former CEO of DaVita Kent Thiry, I went into "safety first" mode! I decided to block and ask questions later, even though the person behind the account started to Direct Message me. Odds are it is a scam or a put-on, but long shots do come in now and then don't they? So I went back to the @elonmusk_1fan to take another look - I'm now blocked (tit for tat, I admire that) However I got to thinking about what I would say if it really was @elonmusk. So let me go into dream mode here, I'll take my meds when I'm done:
"Mr. Musk, I first want to apologize for blocking you. After years of being a kidney dialysis advocate and seeing things like this, I hope you understand how I might be a little jumpy. But assuming it was you and not a scammer I thought about what I would say. Actually I'm thinking about what Mr. Rogers would say. I've been thinking about him a lot lately and using the thought of him to calm my mind before I post on X and hoping he can help me calm the X waters there.
First he would invite you to the neighborhood and congratulate you for fixing up jalopies and making them nice and shiny and new - and less smelly (sure, we knew you could). Then he would inform you that there is a used car dealer in the neighborhood by the name of Warren Buffett. He has been selling some reputable merchandise, but along with that are some lemons (cigar butts as Charlie Munger would call them). Probably the biggest cigar butt would have to be a junker called DaVita. There are rumors (that I started) that Mr. Buffett has been paid visits from his former partner - the chains rattling are keeping him awake at night! Add to that the visions of hell he has been getting lately. He is realizing he is going to be run out of town permanently here soon and is starting to get a little edgy and would love to unload that junker - maybe selling it to somebody who sees a 'Road to Redemption' going this way. I'm sure he would love to sell it to somebody who can say "product quality" - he sure couldn't."
Petition (and see our visit to DC and DC Press Conference + Rally)
- Blog #18 A Christmas Carol, starring Warren Buffett with Charlie Munger in the Role of a modern Jacob Marley
- Blog #17 Announcement: Denver SaveTheBillionairesOrNot Memorial Walk for Kidney Dialysis Patients coming up!!! Sunday December 3rd, 2023
- Blog #16 Denial isn't a River in Egypt
- Blog #15 Stock Guru Jim Cramer Part 2
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