Health Care is a Moral Right, a Safeguard of Human Life

Affordable Health Care

"I was ill and you cared for me" (Mt 25:36)

All persons have a moral right to basic physical and behavioral health care. Access to basic health care is a fundamental human right, necessary for the development and maintenance of life and for the ability of human beings to realize the fullness of their dignity.

A fundamental measure of our society is how we care for the poor and vulnerable. It is not acceptable that millions of people in our country and hundreds of thousands in Kentucky do not have access to affordable health care. We need a new commitment in our nation and our Commonwealth to insure access to affordable health care for all in a way that reflects a priority concern for the poor.

The Church's Teaching on Health Care

For the Catholic community, health and the healing ministry are rooted in the biblical vision to heal persons who are sick, with special protection of people who are poor and needy, as well as the demands of social justice and the duty to promote the common good, the good of all people and the whole person.

"The Church has always sought to embody our Savior's concern for the sick. The gospel
accounts of Jesus' ministry draw special attention to his acts of healing: he cleansed a man with leprosy (Mt 8:1-4; Mk 1:40-42); he gave sight to two people who were blind (Mt 20:29-34; Mk 10:46-52); he enabled one who was mute to speak (Lk 11:14); he cured a woman who was hemorrhaging (Mt 9:20-22; Mk 5:25-34); and he brought a young girl back to life (Mt 9:18, 23-25; Mk 5:35-42). Indeed, the Gospels are replete with examples of how the Lord cured every kind of ailment and disease (Mt 9:35). In the account of Matthew, Jesus' mission fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah: 'He took away our infirmities and bore our diseases' (Mt 8:17; cf. Is 53:4)."

Pope John XXIII in his encyclical Peace on Earth identified a charter of human rights beginning with the right to life. Peace on Earth taught that health care was a basic right of humans flowing from the sanctity and dignity of human life. Health care is instrumental in safeguarding the right to life.

Pope John Paul II focused on the need for health care to be available and affordable to humans in his encyclical On Human Work. Further he recognized that as people we are responsible for the society we create and we must work to remove social barriers that are unjust or impede the common good. Pope John Paul II identified structural injustice or social sins as "certain situations or the collective behavior of certain social groups" that are "the result of the accumulation and concentration of many personal sins." He condemned such "social evil" and "appealed to the consciences of all, so that each may shoulder his or her responsibility seriously and courageously in order to change those disastrous conditions and intolerable situations."

The 1993 Statement of the Catholic Bishops of the United States, Framework for Comprehensive Health Care Reform reiterated the bishops' "constant teaching that each human life must be protected and human dignity promoted" and their insistence that all people have a right to health care. It found that the "existing patterns of health care in the United States do not meet the minimal standard of social justice and the common good. ...The principal defect is that more than 35 million persons do not have guaranteed access to basic health care. ...The current health care system is so inequitable, and the disparities between rich and poor and those with access and those without are so great that it is clearly unjust."

In 2005, the injustice has increased, as over 45 million persons do not have guaranteed access to basic health care. The lack of access to affordable health care for so many children and adults in our country and in Kentucky is a structural injustice that harms people and undermines the common good. "The responsibility for attaining the common good, besides falling to individual persons, belongs to the State, since the common good is the reason that the political authority exists." Like Pope John Paul II, we appeal to the consciences of all, so that each may shoulder his or her responsibility courageously in order to change the unjust conditions.

Principles for Health Care Reform

In the debate over health care, we continue to use as our guide the principles for public policy and the criteria for reform from the 1981 pastoral letter of the American Bishops, Health and Health Care, and the 1993 Statement of the Catholic Bishops of the United States, Framework for Comprehensive Health Care Reform. We affirmed these in our 1992 CCK Statement, Essential Criteria for Systematic Health Care Reform. A summary of the criteria for health care reform we apply to public policy proposals out of our faith's concern for the health of our neighbors in need is:

1) Respect for Life - preserving and enhancing human life from conception to natural death.

2) Priority Concern for the Poor - giving special priority to health care needs of the poor, ensuring that their health care is quality health care.

3) Universal Access to Comprehensive Benefits - providing universal access to comprehensive benefits sufficient to maintain and promote good physical and behavioral health.

4) Pursuing the Common Good and Preserving Pluralism - allowing and encouraging the involvement of all sectors, including the religious and voluntary sectors, in all aspects of health care, ensuring respect for the ethical and religious values of consumers and providers.

5) Cost Containment and Controls - creating effective cost-containment measures that reduce waste, inefficiency, and unnecessary care and establish incentives to users and providers to make economic use of limited resources and to control rising costs of competition, commercialism, administration and legal costs.

6) Equitable Financing