Peter Jennings Reporting: 'Breakdown -- America's Health Insurance Crisis'

ByABC News
November 17, 2005, 3:22 PM

— -- Today in the United States there are an estimated 46 million people without health insurance. That's nearly one in six -- and the numbers continue to grow.

In the last documentary reported before his death, Peter Jennings reveals how the breakdown of the country's health insurance system threatens almost every American and all areas of American life: family, business and community. Who's to blame? It's not as simple as you think.

"Peter Jennings Reporting: Breakdown -- America's Health Insurance Crisis" will air Thursday, Dec. 15 at 10 p.m. EST on the ABC Television Network with a special introduction by ABC News anchor Charles Gibson.

"Over the course of Peter's long career at ABC News he made more than 60 prime-time documentaries, many of them covering public health issues. He had planned for this broadcast to be the first of a series confronting the problems in the American health-care system -- a subject he believed was critical to all Americans," said Tom Yellin, executive producer of Peter Jennings Reporting.

"Peter conducted most of the interviews for 'Breakdown' in the months before he learned he had lung cancer," Yellin continued. "The broadcast was written and edited while he underwent treatment. Peter's voice was not strong enough to narrate the program, but, as you will see, it is still very much Peter Jennings Reporting."

"Peter Jennings Reporting: Breakdown -- America's Health Insurance Crisis" is produced by Keith Summa. Tom Yellin is the executive producer of Peter Jennings Reporting.