In 2005 and 2006, Ladies’ Home Journal published articles to "Help Save Our Emergency Rooms!" thousands of people responded.  Here are excerpted comments from people across America:

"I am deeply concerned about ER access.  I urge you to reform our ER situation through our nation.  I am so worried about access and good quality care in our vastly populated state.  There have been so many closures."
Mary Woll
Irvine, California

"My husband’s life has been saved three times this year because of emergency room doctors.  Really a need for this service.
Evelyn Davidson
Brighton, Michigan

"We can’t do away with emergency rooms.  They are the ‘life line’ of America."
Audrey Rogers
Newkirk, Oklahoma

"To close ERs would mean certain death to many. How inhuman can you get?  It could be you or your loved one."
Virginia C. Baker
Essex Junction, Vermont

"I bet when members of Congress find they need an emergency room, they will want one to be available and ready to meet their needs.  It could meant he difference between life or death."
Tammy Morris
Orange, Virginia

 "When I need the ER for my asthma attacks, I need them NOW or it could be literally my last breath."
Ruth Nease
Fairfield, Ohio 

"I took my 89 year-old mother to the ER when she had a stroke, and was told they had three trauma patients they had to see first. They say they have no beds available…I can’t believe how elderly patients are treated…I could write a book on what has happened after she reached her 85th birthday."
Jo Ann Banner
Elizabethton, Tennessee

"I went to emergency room my doctor sent me at 10 PM.  I sat in the ER till 5 AM until I finally got a bed at 6 AM.  This is terrible.  I was in pain."
Loretta Miller
Orchard Park, New York

"Please save our emergency rooms.  We lost everything when Katrina hit Bay St. Louis, Mississippi.  We know what it is like not to have the care that is needed.  Thank you."
Jacquelyn Chittenden
Spring Lake, Mississippi

"The storm Katrina in New Orleans was just a sample of what can happen if we the U.S.A. have a terrorist attack in some form that will spread over a large portion of our country."
Ann H. Bailey
Rome, Georgia

"Son on chemo rushed to ER many times for effects of chemo.  Husband not breathing, rushed to ER – lived two days.  He was glad to see doctors."
Patricia May
Fort Worth, Texas

"I live in a rural area 62 miles out of Knoxville, Tennessee.  I spent five and a half hours in that ER with my intestines out. … No surgeon would touch me.  I was near death when my family insisted I be transferred to Knoxville.
Debra Holt
Morristown, Tennessee

"This emergency room crisis hits homes.  After spending 11 hours with my husband in pulmonary distress and not seeing a doctor, I can relate to this problem."
Dorothy Greig
Grand Blanc, Michigan

"Recently widow, I pay $250.00 a month for insurance.  I need all the help I can get.  Emergency rooms are very important to someone like me who don’t have anyone else."
Georgina LaGrone
Lewisville, Texas

"My husband was admitted into an ER at a major hospital here at 6 PM and wasn’t moved to a regular room until 4 AM."
Pam Gajdos
Solon, Ohio