Lobbyist and advocate Bob Marcus requests your help to promote Co-Sponsors for HR 818.


By Robert E. Marcus, J. D., Marcus & Associates

Have you visited the “Co-sponsors” link on CAOMA's “Medicare Page?”  If not, please click onto that link for an updated list of current co-sponsors of the Federal Acupuncture Coverage Act of 2005.  There you can see if your congressman or congresswoman is a co-sponsor of H. R. 818, and when they signed on.

If your representative is already a co-sponsor, I encourage you to thank them by letter and/or by e-mail.  If you don't know who your representative is, you can find out and how to contact them, by going to Find Your Representative and entering your zip code on the official government website.
    
If your representative is not a co-sponsor of H. R. 818, please see the HR 818 Text link, so you can read the bill.  I encourage you to support the passage of H. R. 1477, and to send your representative a constituent (voting district resident/citizen) letter with some of your own personal testimonial experiences with acupuncture.

Your constituent letter is extremely important, indeed essential, in generating the grassroots support needed to achieve a critical threshold of one-hundred co-sponsors that will open the door to H. R. 818 being scheduled for a hearing and vote in the Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Health.  Once H. R. 818 is reported by the full Committee on Energy and Commerce, that will set the stage for the Hinchey Bill to go to the Rules Committee, and ultimately to the floor of the House for a vote. It's a long process that begins with your support.

If you contact your Congressional Representative, and/or his or her staff, and/or you write your Representative a constituent letter, please contact me by phone or email listed below, to let me know with whom you spoke, and how it went, so I can follow-up with your representative's Health Aide (staff person assigned to health-related legislation) in Washington, D. C.

BECOME A DISTRICT POINT PERSON

I need local contacts who are willing to be designated as "District Point Persons" who can personally lobby their representatives if they are not yet co-sponsors of HR 818, and to continue to keep them informed about the status of HR 818 after they have signed on.

If you are not currently a District Point Person, and you'd like to lobby your representative, in his or her district office, to co-sponsor H. R. 818, educate them a bit about the benefits of Oriental medicine, and/or offer them, and/or their staff, an acupuncture treatment, please contact me at my e-mail address or postal address, and/or telephone me, so I can contact you, send you state and national materials on acupuncture and Oriental medicine, and facilitate a scheduled appointment between you and your representative.

SUPPORT THE ACUPUNCTURE MEDICARE CAMPAIGN

Encourage others to contribute their letters, time, and money to the campaign. Go to  the How to Support HR 818 page for further information. Download a fundraising flyer that you can share with others.

Sincerely,

Bob Marcus

Legislative Advocate

Marcus_Associates@yahoo.com

Marcus & Associates

731 Westholme Avenue

Los Angeles, California 90024

(276) 492-8098