Foreword - Creighton Law Review

• Publication year: 2022
• Citation: Vol. 34

34 Creighton L. Rev. 893. FOREWORD - CREIGHTON LAW REVIEW

Creighton Law Review

Vol. 34

E. Benjamin Nelson

United States Senator for Nebraska

Few issues considered by policymakers catch the attention of the public more than health care. This premise was validated in the last election as virtually every candidate seeking public office addressed, either out of genuine concern or as a result of publicly-induced queries, a spectrum of health-care related issues. Candidates espoused the importance of prescription drug coverage and the protection of Medicare, and they debated details of what an effective Patients' Bill of Rights would include. This has proven true in my first months as a United States Senator, as the Senate has already focused on issues such as the Patients' Bill of Rights and Medicare funding.

The universality of health issues, perhaps, helps explain why Americans are so captivated and concerned about the state of health care. It has been said that taxes and death are the only two "certainties" in life. Well, contact with the health-care system may have been inadvertently left off the list (although there may be merit to an argument asserting that health care falls under the latter of the two "certainties"). We are all affected by health, whether it is our health or that of a spouse or child. Health - ours and theirs - defines how we live; conversely, how we live - or they live - can determine our health. As a result of this inevitable management of our own health, the health of our children or that of our parents, almost everyone has...