The Road to American Health

When the Road to American Health Care pulled into Denver on Saturday for the Democratic National Convention, it began the last leg of a 16-state journey that started four months ago in Cleveland, Ohio. Since hitting the road on April 29, the Road to American Health Care bus has truly been a vehicle for change, giving a voice to the millions of people across the country struggling with health care costs:

rom the Erie, Pennsylvania child care worker who spends nearly a quarter of her take-home pay on health care costs, and prays she doesn't get sick/p>

o the Charlottesville, Virginia doctor who is seeing more and more middle-class families come to his free health clinic because they can't afford anything else...

rom the Vietnam veteran in Toledo, Ohio, who waited three months to see a doctor at the under funded, understaffed VA center - worrying that the spot on his lung was cancer/p>

o the Iraq War veteran in Springfield, Missouri, who wonders whether the VA will be around at all if John McCain's health care proposals become law/p>

rom the hospital nurse in Madison, Wisconsin who sees patients delay the care they need because they have no insurance/p>

o the school nurse in Albuquerque, New Mexico whose students get sick over the weekend but wait until Monday to see her - because even though their parents work two jobs each, they can't afford the doctor's visit/p>

rom the State Representative and RN in Columbus, Ohio whose elderly patient cut his medication in half to help control costs - and wound up on breathing machine in the intensive care unit/p>

o the child care worker in Spokane, Washington who lost her home, her job, and went bankrupt because she had to have heart surgery - and had no insurance.

These are the stories that the Road to American Health Care carries into Denver and Minneapolis for the Democratic and Republican National Conventions - sending the message that the time is now to build a new, American health care system. See www.seiu.org for more.