I attended Rep. Jay Inslee’s town meeting in Edmonds and would like to correct some misstatements that he and other supporters of Obama’s health bill are making.

Rep. Inslee: you said there is “no death panel” in the bill. You addressed the end-of-life counseling, but that is not what most of us think of as the “death panel.” We consider the panel that will determine the cost/benefit ratio of procedures to be the true death panel.

I am 75 years old and have seven stents, three joint replacements, kidney cancer and diabetes — all paid for by an excellent insurance program from my work. (Yes, I am still working full time.) However, under the cost/benefit ratio analysis panel, it would never have been considered cost effective to fund the surgeries that have kept me being a working, contributing human being. Too old, too many problems — much better to give her pain medication, let her go and concentrate on younger people instead.

Scared? You bet!

Especially since your (and O’s) statement that “if you like your insurance, you can keep it.” Not if the government sets up a system that will encourage my employer to drop the private insurance plan. I was talking to our company owner, and he said if the government forced through a public option and just fined him a couple thousand dollars for not covering his employees, in this economy when he is trying to keep our small, 30-year-in-business company operating, he would have no choice but to end the private insurance and pay the penalty. It would be the most cost-effective step he could take and might be the only choice left to him economically. In other words, “you can keep your insurance for now” but (unsaid) “I am going to make it so that, in the end, you will have no choice in the matter.”

You and other supporters of the bill have interpreted these items one way. Now you have my interpretation which, I assure you, is the way the vast majority of people my age look at the O plan.

Lee Wallot, Snohomish