Meet Kathy Fields Lander, our latest unsung hero of healthcare Reform! This project of HEAL California highlights the hard work and dedication of individuals who are working – often in the background – to win Medicare-for-All in California and the nation.
Born into the entertainment industry, Kathy Fields Lander has worked in different areas of the field, while also becoming an advocate for many causes. But it was the precariousness of life that made her a single-payer healthcare activist.
Her awareness of all the issues came after her husband, actor and comedian David Lander, was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis in 1984. Later, as his condition worsened, his union healthcare coverage began to be threatened. The Screen Actors Guild, like similar unions, require a member to have a certain amount of earnings or days worked during a certain period in order to keep benefits. Without meeting those marks, members must pay an exorbitant Cobra premium to keep coverage.
“David is a perfect example of falling through the cracks,” Kathy said. “Here was someone who was working steadily and qualified for his Screen Actor Guild health care for decades, but then was about to drop off the rolls because he couldn’t work much anymore. I was fighting for small jobs for him just to keep him qualified at that point. It was very difficult. I also realized he would not be the only one.”
So out of the long ordeal, Lander found where she could be of value and soon joined the universal healthcare movement, using her industry contacts to help get out the message.
“I knew that many people in the industry would be at risk,” she said. “They would just drop off and lose coverage. That’s why I thought the entertainment industry would be particularly interested in this. Our work is hit and miss. Even if someone isn’t ill, if they lose their insurance, that’s pretty scary, so all the unions got right on board. They have a big burden trying to take care of their members. If someone doesn’t work much in one year, there’s nothing a union can do, the person just doesn’t qualify.”
Lander was also a good fit to garner support among the entertainment industry. She is the daughter of agent and producer Freddie Fields and actress Edith Fellows. She married David, best known as Squiggy in Laverne & Shirley, in 1979, and they have a daughter, Natalie Lander, who is also an actress.
Kathy began her career as an actress in feature films, stage and television, co-starring in “The Happy Ending” and “Johnny Got His Gun” She was trained as a fellow at the American Film Institute as one of two female directors in the late 1970s and was the second woman to become a member of Local 659, the cinematographer’s union, as a still photographer, working on more than a dozen films. She then went on to earn her Master’s and became a licensed family therapist.
She joined a group that supported several legislative efforts spearheaded by former state Sen. Sheila Kuehl, D-Santa Monica, in the 2000s. Two similar single-payer bills passed the California Legislature but were vetoed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
She is currently co-chair of the California OneCare Entertainment Strategy Taskforce, which educates and enlists people in the entertainment industry to bring awareness to Californians about the Healthy California Act, SB 562. As part of the campaign, she along with Don Schroeder, chairman of California OneCare, produced 90 PSAs.
“We wanted to sell this to the public, and we used people in the entertainment industry who had credibility,” she said. “We wanted an immediate presence in the public eye to be ready to fight the insurance companies down the line. And that was our job, we knew we were going to have to come out with the big guns against the insurance companies so that they couldn’t take us down by putting a referendum on the ballot, when it is passed again, and inundate the public with lies and false advertising.”
Unfortunately, the bill appears to be effectively shelved this legislative session. She knows single payer healthcare, “Medical for All as we like to reference it” will take more time. In the meantime, she’s focused on flipping seats to get more Democrats elected, which will include fundraising to donate money to groups that have the “troops in the field”. “But once a new single payer bill is introduced, entertainment advocates will pick up the pace,” she added.
“For me, it is a passion,” Lander said. “And yes, part of it was my husband, because if he didn’t have insurance, he wouldn’t have been taken care of. But I would also be losing my insurance and my daughter would have lost hers. In my mind, it became about families. We can’t keep the American family going on private insurance when people’s jobs are so tenuous and costs so high. It’s just not possible. The stress involved, and the dance you have to do around the system to get your needs met, and I’ve experience all sides of this, has to end. We need to have single payer, both for the well being of our citizens and the economic well being of our state. Hopefully, it will eventually be the whole nation, and that’s the only thing that makes sense.”
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