Letters to the Editor: If ‘new blood’ is desirable, why appoint former mayor to City Council?
The La Cañada Flintridge City Council loves to make “safe” decisions. It did so when it made a call for applicants instead of a call for an election to fill a vacant council seat following the passing of beloved Councilman David Spence. It did so again with the appointment of former Councilman Greg Brown. When Brown announced in 2010 he would retire from City Council when his term expired in 2011, he said he wanted to make room for “new blood.” It seems he now feels differently.
If it was “new blood” that the council and Brown were looking for, they should have called for an election. Only in an election will the voters of the city of La Cañada Flintridge be in a position of genuine power. Term limits may provide some genuine power to the people as well. The council’s selection of a former council member without giving more than a quarter of an hour’s consideration to anyone else suggests a certain clubiness and opacity among our elected and appointed officials. Many of the 15 applicants offered creative solutions and new ideas for the city. The voters will decide on March 5, 2019.
Kevork Kurdoghlian
La Cañada
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Re: “Why we fight for universal healthcare,” commentary, July 13. Rep. Schiff details the need to expand healthcare to millions of Americans, and while this is an admirable goal worth full-throated support, any healthcare reform effort maintaining the status quo of insurance companies covering so many Americans must address the tactics used by insurance companies to inflate their profit margins.
Reforming the nation’s healthcare system requires scrutinizing the tactics insurance companies use to slash covered benefits, while bilking patients out of more money. It gives patients little peace of mind if they purchase insurance to prevent bankruptcy from a single medical crisis, only to find their insurer won’t pay for necessary treatments once a crisis hits.
Insurance companies are refusing to cover a growing number of prescription medications — now including treatments for leukemia and prostate cancer — through a tactic called “formulary exclusions” and by restricting access to oncology care to the lowest bidder. The number of prescriptions excluded from health plans has quadrupled in the last five years, yet a 2015 Kaiser study found that Americans with employer-sponsored healthcare have seen their premiums rise by 255% since 2006.
Insurers try to save money by excluding the most expensive drugs, preferring cheaper alternatives. While several drugs can treat similar illnesses or symptoms, doctors make choices based on both a drug’s specific characteristics and a patient’s physiology. In too many cases, the treatment the insurance company will cover isn’t as effective as the treatment a doctor preferred, or the covered treatment introduces complications that could have been avoided, had the insurance covered the preferred medication.
Americans should not have to doubt whether their insurance will cover treatments their doctors say are essential to continued health and well-being.
Mariana S-B Lamb
Upland
The writer is president of Efficient Physician, Inc., executive director of the Medical Oncology Assn. of Southern California, Inc.; president of the National Oncology Society Network, Inc.; advisory board member of the Community Oncology Alliance, Inc. and editorial board adviser to Oncology Practice Management magazine.