Hope Street Group's Monique Nadeau submitted the following letter to the editor of the New York Times in response to an April 9 op-ed:

To the Editor:

    Forget universal health care coverage? Then you can forget the American Dream, too.

    Ramesh Ponnuru, in his April 9 op-ed ("The Misguided Quest for Universal Coverage"), is wrong to oppose the goal of universal access to health care coverage.

    While Mr. Ponnuru takes on the "practical, moral and political" cases for universal coverage, he ignores the most compelling case of all – the economic case. Hope Street Group, the non-partisan policy organization that I lead, has developed an Economic Opportunity Index (EOI) to show that the economic future of our people and our country depends on all of our citizens having access to health care coverage. The EOI demonstrates that health accounts for almost 25% of the total variation in economic opportunity.

    The author seems to imply that the only debate is about providing universal health care, unnecessarily raising costs. The fact is that controlling costs and improving quality are just as important, and are an integral part of all serious health reform discussions taking place in DC.

    To deny universal coverage -- and to ignore this opportunity to drastically remake the system -- is to deny millions of Americans the opportunity to lead healthy, productive lives and diminishes our country’s chance to regain its global competitiveness and widespread prosperity.

    Monique Nadeau
    Executive Director
    Hope Street Group