The Healthcare Movie
- Run Time: 71 minutes
- Condensed version: 35 minutes
- Narrator: Kiefer Sutherland
This documentary provides the real story of how the health care systems in Canada and the United States evolved to be so completely different when at one point, they were essentially the same. An intense political struggle led to the universal medical care system in Canada. Meanwhile, for almost a century, negative PR campaigns have been prevalent in the U.S. to dissuade the public from supporting national health care.
NOW IS THE TIME: Healthcare for Everybody
- Run Time: 71 mins
- Directors: Laurie Simons, Terry Sterrenberg
The United States pays almost twice as much for healthcare as any other industrialized nation, yet it still does not provide care for all its citizens. While the Affordable Care Act has helped some people, many of us are feeling the pinch of rising costs and narrowing networks. Yet, polls show that 58% of Americans favor a national publicly funded healthcare program. So why has the U.S. Congress not yet passed- or even considered- such a plan? This documentary delves into what single-payer healthcare is, how it saves money, and what behind-the-scenes heroes are doing to clear the fog of misperception that keeps us from moving forward.
SiCKO - By Michael Moore
- Run Time: 123 mins
- Director: Michael Moore
Filmmaker Michael Moore examines America's health-care crisis and why millions of citizens are without coverage. Moore spotlights the cases of several ordinary citizens whose lives have been shattered by bureaucratic red tape, refusal of payment, and other health-care catastrophes. He explains how the system has become so problematic, and he visits countries where citizens receive free health care, as in Canada, France, and the U.K.
Sick Around the World - By T. R. Reid
- Run Time: 60 mins
- Director: Jon Palfreman
- Screenplay: T. R. Reid, Jon Palfreman
Funded by PBS, the Colorado Trust, the Commonwealth Fund, and the MacArthur, Park, and Colorado Health foundations, the documentary, Sick Around the World, explores the pros and cons of universal coverage, the cost of drugs, and what it's like to practice medicine in different countries. T. R. Reid visits five industrialized democracies, seeking to learn how they manage to provide high-quality health care for everybody -- while spending half as much on medical costs as the U.S. does.
Power To Heal
- Directed by Charles Burnett & Daniel Loewenthal
- Produced by Barbara Berney, Roberta Friedman, Daniel Loewenthal
- Screenplay: T. R. Reid, Jon Palfreman
- Executive Producers: Tammy Robinson, Martin Dornbaum
- Narrator: Danny Glover
POWER TO HEAL tells a poignant chapter in the historic struggle to secure equal and adequate access to healthcare for all Americans. Central to the story is the tale of how a new national program, Medicare, was used to mount a dramatic, coordinated effort that desegregated thousands of hospitals across the country practically overnight.
Before Medicare, disparities in access to hospital care were dramatic. Less than half the nation's hospitals served black and white patients equally, and in the South, 1/3 of hospitals would not admit African-Americans even for emergencies.
Using the carrot of Medicare dollars, the federal government virtually ended the practice of racially segregating patients, doctors, medical staffs, blood supplies and linens. POWER TO HEAL illustrates how Movement leaders and grass-roots volunteers pressed and worked with the federal government to achieve a greater measure of justice and fairness for African-Americans.