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Dr. Ogan Gurel to Walk for Health Care from Chicago to Washington DC beginning Saturday, June 27
For Immediate Release
Chicago, IL, Thursday, June 25, 2009—On Saturday, June 27, 2009 at 8:00 a.m., Dr. Ogan Gurel will leave Chicago’s Daley Plaza en route for Washington DC to launch the Walk for Health Care, a nearly 700-mile journey by foot, aiming to draw attention to the very real stories of hardship and inequity that persist in our health care system. Dr. Gurel plans to meet people along the way and share their stories via his blog, Facebook, and Twitter. He hopes to arrive in Washington DC on Sunday, July 26. For more information on the Walk for Health Care visit walk4healthcare.org, join the Facebook group (The Walk For Healthcare) or follow on Twitter @walk4healthcare.
“Nearly 50 million Americans lack health insurance; many more are grossly uninsured,” said Dr. Gurel. “Every American deserves healthcare and as a matter of public health, economic security, and simple human dignity, healthcare is a common good.”
This is a grassroots effort supported by individual monetary or in-kind contributions. Those wishing to support The Walk For Healthcare with monetary donations to cover lodging and meals or are able to host Ogan should email donate@walk4healthcare.org. The route follows the Lincoln Highway (once a patchwork of private roads, now part of the U.S. highway system) traveling through cities and towns in Indiana, Ohio, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Maryland.
“By the end of the walk,” added Dr. Gurel, “the many stories we have gathered, shared and documented will provide a compelling narrative which absolutely cannot be ignored.”
Dr. Gurel came up with the idea of the walk not in an effort to uphold any particular policy position or piece of legislation, but rather to bring out the voice of the people and to advance the principles of universality and affordability as a framework for moving the health care debate forward. “Healthcare for all,” Dr. Gurel noted, “makes us greater as a nation and freer as individuals.”
“Nearly 50 million Americans lack health insurance; many more are grossly uninsured,” said Dr. Gurel. “Every American deserves healthcare and as a matter of public health, economic security, and simple human dignity, healthcare is a common good.”
This is a grassroots effort supported by individual monetary or in-kind contributions. Those wishing to support The Walk For Healthcare with monetary donations to cover lodging and meals or are able to host Ogan should email donate@walk4healthcare.org. The route follows the Lincoln Highway (once a patchwork of private roads, now part of the U.S. highway system) traveling through cities and towns in Indiana, Ohio, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Maryland.
“By the end of the walk,” added Dr. Gurel, “the many stories we have gathered, shared and documented will provide a compelling narrative which absolutely cannot be ignored.”
Dr. Gurel came up with the idea of the walk not in an effort to uphold any particular policy position or piece of legislation, but rather to bring out the voice of the people and to advance the principles of universality and affordability as a framework for moving the health care debate forward. “Healthcare for all,” Dr. Gurel noted, “makes us greater as a nation and freer as individuals.”
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Dr. Gurel, originally from New York City and a graduate of Stuyvesant High School, is a physician educated at Harvard University and the Columbia University College of Physicians & Surgeons. He completed surgical internship at the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston and having also worked as a healthcare consultant, an international medical relief physician (in Macedonia during the NATO campaign and in Turkey after the 1999 earthquake), a medical device company CEO, and a basic biomedical researcher, Dr. Gurel has seen virtually all sides of healthcare both in the U.S. and abroad. He has been a patient (both insured and uninsured) and presently, as a self-employed consultant, he, like nearly 50 million other Americans, lacks health insurance.
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