Column: Decisions about health coverage
Published 12:00 am Sunday, September 21, 2014
One of the best investments made by The Bulletin has been in health news coverage.
Coverage of this critical Central Oregon industry has been a great part of our success as a community newspaper, but it has also prompted difficult questions concerning individuals in need.
It’s perfectly understandable.
Our reporters try to frame stories around individuals with health conditions and medical needs.
After publication, the phone calls, emails and letters arrive asking us to help raise money for a friend or loved one with a similar condition or challenge. The stories are often heart-rending, and it would take a pretty cold journalist not to consider a response.
But, for a number of good reasons, we can’t be in the money-raising business.
It wasn’t that long ago that we didn’t have much health coverage. But watching the booming population of Central Oregon and the growth of the health industry here, we hired reporters dedicated to the issues, developed a weekly health section and now publish a quarterly magazine called PULSE.
Judging by reader response, all of it has been a winner.
The reporters and their editors for these publications look for important new issues or compelling personal stories that we can write about to explore larger issues.
There is no question that a story might prompt donations or other help to an individual whose particular situation lies at the center of the story.
Yet our purpose is not to benefit that person necessarily or individually, but to describe the challenges faced by anyone and everyone in such a condition.
In any of these stories, there can be significant disagreements about potential treatments, the efficacy of certain approaches, the actual condition of the individual and the expense and role of insurance.
We try to explain these differences in an evenhanded way, but taking up the side of a particular individual would jeopardize any objectivity that our reporters can bring to these difficult questions.
If, on the other hand, individuals, groups or nonprofit organizations set out to raise money for a cause, we are prepared to let the public know how — in short form in the newspaper — it can contribute.
We often publish dates, times and places of fundraising events and the names and locations of bank accounts established to benefit particular conditions and individuals.
Those are in the category of public announcements, and we are happy to publish them.
None of these decisions is perfect, but they are born of the best of intentions in the areas of health news coverage and journalistic integrity.
These are, no doubt, difficult decisions, and they are certain to get more challenging.
The unfolding Affordable Care Act and Oregon’s developing coordinated care organizations, both of which seek to reduce costs in health care, are going to produce winners and losers.
There will be tremendous pressure on medical professionals to save money on procedures, which could be the right way to go.
And while many intellectually believe the reforms are necessary, the commitment to the cause likely will create different responses if care is reduced.
The landscape of health care coverage in our community is changing, not just for the individual with a particular challenge, but for all of us.
Our responsibility is to cast a wide net with the hope that many will see themselves and their concerns in our stories and learn about a path to better health.
That was — and remains — our objective as we set out to expand our coverage in this vital area.
— John Costa is editor-in-chief of The Bulletin. Contact: 541-383-0337, jcosta@bendbulletin.com