Health Care

  By Adam Gaffney The Guardian (12/11/18) If you can’t undercut a popular proposal as undesirable, make it sound impossible. That, in any event, has been the tack of opponents of single-payer healthcare, also called improved “Medicare-for-all”. “[W]e got to get away from these falsehoods and start talking about the truth …” opined billionaire Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz on CNBC last June, while contending that single-payer healthcare was economically infeasible. “I think a lot of the analysis has shown it’s unaffordable,” claimed Seema Verma, head of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, last summer, quoted by Kaiser Health News. The real stumbling block…

  Democracy Now! (11/30/18) As Democrats prepare to take control of the House, pressure is growing on the Democratic leadership to embrace Medicare for All. Nearly 50 newly Democratic members of Congress campaigned for Medicare for All. In the last year, 123 incumbent House Democrats also co-sponsored Medicare for All legislation, double the number who supported a Medicare for All bill in the previous legislative session. Meanwhile, pharmaceutical, insurance and hospital companies are paying close attention. As the Intercept’s Lee Fang reports, over the summer the groups formed a partnership to fight the growing support for expanding Medicare. We speak…

By Joan McCarter Daily Kos (10/15/18) When all else fails, Republicans resort to playing the victim because that’s the one thing that binds all conservatives—the deep conviction that they’re always being picked on. Watch it play out in this tearful video from Rep. Lou Barletta (R-PA) who’s upset that the man he’s challenging for Senate, Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA), is running an ad reminding voters that Barletta wants to take their health care away. Barletta has a grandson with cancer, which is a horrible thing to have to go through—something millions of families know from awful experience. Like Stacie Ritter of Manheim…

  By Reveal Staff Reveal / Center for Investigative Reporting (10/2/18)  “Heroin(e),” the story of three women battling the opioid epidemic in West Virginia, has won an Emmy Award for outstanding short documentary. Directed by Elaine McMillion Sheldon and produced by Kerrin Sheldon, the film follows efforts to break the devastating cycle of drug abuse in Huntington, a city with an overdose rate 10 times the national average. The Netflix original documentary was co-produced by The Center for Investigative Reporting and Requisite Media. It was part of CIR’s Glassbreaker Films initiative, funded by the Helen Gurley Brown Foundation, which supported women in documentary filmmaking and investigative…

By Bram Sable-Smith Saturday Weekend Edition / NPR (9/1/18) Diabetic ketoacidosis is a terrible way to die. It’s what happens when you don’t have enough insulin. Your blood sugar gets so high that your blood becomes highly acidic, your cells dehydrate and your body stops functioning. Diabetic ketoacidosis is how Nicole Smith-Holt lost her son. Three days before his payday. Because he couldn’t afford his insulin. “It shouldn’t have happened,” Smith-Holt says looking down at her son’s death certificate on her dining room table in Richfield, Minn. “That cause of death of diabetic ketoacidosis should have never happened.” The price…

  By Robin Marty, Farah Diaz-Tello & Loretta J. Ross In These Times (8/27/18) WITH PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP’S SELECTION of conservative Brett Kavanaugh to replace Anthony Kennedy on the Supreme Court, the remaining abortion protections put in place by the Roe v. Wade decision are under dire threat. We asked three reproductive justice experts—journalist and activist Robin Marty, attorney Farah Diaz-Tello and SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective co-founder Loretta J. Ross—to explain this new political reality and how we should respond. The three short essays making up the article include: BACK TO THE UNDERGROUND — Within a few years,…

  On Point / WBUR (8/2/18) Did a conservative think tank just give Bernie Sanders the evidence for his “Medicare for All” plan? We’ll ask them and Sanders. Guests Dylan Scott, heath care policy reporter for Vox. (@dylanlscott) Sen. Bernie Sanders, independent senator from Vermont. Introduced the Medicare for All Act of 2017. (@SenSanders) Charles Blahous, senior research strategist at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. Former senior economic adviser to President George W. Bush. Carmen Heredia Rodriguez, reporter at Kaiser Health News. (@caheredia21) Link to 47-Minute Audio Vox: “Bernie Sanders’s $32 trillion Medicare-for-all plan is actually kind of a bargain”…

  By Mark Zdechlik MPR (7/2/18) Tammy Fox wanted to help after a friend took ill with a rare and difficult-to-diagnosis autoimmune disorder that required many trips to the Mayo Clinic. While she couldn’t do anything medically, Fox knew there was a way to ease some of the burden of medical bills and costs associated with doctor visits. She turned to the internet website GoFundMe. “You’ve got meals, you’ve got hotel stays and, like I said, gas so that all needed to be covered,” said Fox, who lives in suburban Minneapolis. A Commonwealth Fund survey found that nearly half of working-age…

  By Jane Clayson On Point /WBUR (7/2/18) We have heard story after story the last few years about the lives ruined or lost because of the opioid epidemic.  But here’s another real-world impact you might not have noticed:  More addicted adults means more kids entering the foster care system.  Child care agencies and foster families have always had their hands full.  Throw in painkillers, heroin, fentanyl, and they are now swamped.  This hour, On Point: opioid epidemic and the crisis in foster care. What happens when opioids ravage the lives of mothers and fathers? More foster children who need homes…

  By Jessica Corbett Common Dreams (4/12/18) “Five years ago, could you have believed that half of Americans would agree we need a single-payer healthcare system?” That’s how Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.)—a longtime advocate of guaranteeing healthcare for all Americans—responded to a new poll that found that 74 percent of Democrats and 51 percent of all adults surveyed support implementing a single-payerhealthcare system in the United States. “When people see the justice of an idea, it spreads like wildfire,” Sanders tweeted Thursday morning. “The American people know that healthcare should be a right.” The Washington Post-Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) poll asked: “Do you support or oppose having a…

  By Julia Conley Common Dreams (1/16/18) A report published on Tuesday in the Guardian highlights the exorbitant costs associated with childbirth in the United States—often catching families by surprise and leaving them thousands of dollars in debt to hospitals—and underscores the world of difference between maternal care in the U.S. and other industrialized nations with universal healthcare. A study by the advocacy group Childbirth Connection found that while costs vary by state and hospital, the average price tag for a vaginal delivery with no complications, including care for a newborn directly after birth, is $32,093 in the U.S. A caesarean section costs more than…

Democracy Now! (10/19/17) This week, President Donald Trump’s nominee for drug czar, Republican Congressmember Tom Marino, had to withdraw from consideration after a Washington Post/”60 Minutes investigation found he led a drug industry-backed effort to pass a law that weakened the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration’s ability to crack down on addictive opioids. Meanwhile, calls are growing to look at the major pharmaceutical companies that have fueled the opioid crisis. A new investigation by Esquire magazine reveals how the secretive Sackler family, owners of the company that invented OxyContin, downplayed the risks of addiction and exploited doctors’ confusion over the drug’s strength….

  By Trevor Timm The Guardian (9/20/17) When Bernie Sanders released his much anticipated healthcare plan last week, countless pundits and members of Congress asked why the government should pass such a bill given its potential cost. Now that Congress on the verge of sending a record-setting $700bn Pentagon spending bill to Trump’s desk, you can bet those deficit scolds will be nowhere to be found. [Editor’s Note: When black operations, veterans programs and intel operations are taken into account, the US actually spends more than $1 trillion on war each year. – Mark L. Taylor] On Monday evening, the Senate passed – in…

  By David Sirota & Lydia O’Neal Nation of Change (9/20/17) As Bernie Sanders worked to finalize his Medicare-for-All Act of 2017, corporate lobbyists representing the traditional opponents of single-payer health care – including the nation’s major private insurers and drug companies – poured hundreds of thousands of dollars into Senate Democrats’ fundraising accounts. Now, many of those lawmakers have refused to sign on to the Medicare bill. Sanders has faced questions about whether or not the bill would garner solid support among Senate Democrats. So far, 16 Senate Democrats have said they will sponsor the legislation – which the insurance industry slammed after he announced it. A new study from campaign…

    By Jake Johnson Common Dreams (8/16/17) When Sen. Cory Gardner (R-Colo.) took the stage at a scheduled town hall on Tuesday in Greeley, Colorado, he apparently didn’t expect to be confronted by a crowd full of enthusiastic supporters of single-payer healthcare. Angry with his support for legislation that the Congressional Budget Office estimated would strip healthcare from more than 20 million American, Coloradans greeted Gardner with jeers as he arrived at the event. At one point during the discussion, Gardner asked how many in the audience supported single-payer healthcare. An “overwhelming majority in the high school auditorium raised their hands,” reports Colorado…

A system designed to fail. By Dr. Carol Paris Common Dreams (7/28/17) Hundreds of people slept overnight in cars, or camped for days in a field. They told storiesof yanking out their own teeth with pliers, of reusing insulin syringes until they broke in their arm, of chronic pain so debilitating they could hardly care for their own children. At daybreak, they lined up for several more hours outside a white tent, waiting for their chance to visit a doctor. For many, this was the first health care provider they’ve seen in years. Is this a place torn by war, famine…

By Jon Queally Common Dreams (7/23/17) “It isn’t in poor taste, and it isn’t political opportunism—it’s the goddamn point.” That’s what Jon Pavlovitz, a pastor from North Carolina, writes regarding the importance of talking about the recently-announced cancer diagnosis of Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.)—which he calls “tragic” and “horrific”—in the midst of a raging national debate over healthcare. On Thursday, McCain’s doctors confirmed the 80-year-old senator and former presidential nominee had been diagnosed with an aggressive and malignant form of brain cancer. In the wake of the news there was an outpouring of support and well-wishes from across the political spectrum aimed…

  By Jake Johnson Common Dreams (7/24/17) While the Senate GOP’s plan to repeal the Affordable Care Act (ACA) has been denounced as potentially devastating to the poor, the sick, women, people of color, children, and those with pre-existing conditions, a new analysis published Monday finds that no matter what happens, the CEOs of large healthcare companies are likely to continue living lavishly. Since the Affordable Care Act (ACA) passed in 2010, the “CEOs of 70 of the largest U.S. healthcare companies cumulatively have earned $9.8 billion,” according to a report by Axios‘s Bob Herman. “The median household income in 2015 was $56,515, which the average healthcare CEO…

By Eleanor Sheehan Fusion (7/18/17) A day after the Republican party’s effort to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act crumbled, Al Gore spoke at a community college in Manhattan, NY, about his new climate change movie. Completely unrelated to the documentary, however, Gore expressed his support for a single-payer healthcare system. The Huffington Post first reported Gore’s comments during Tuesday’s event. Breaking with ranking Democrats like House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Senator Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, Gore told the audience that private health insurance has failed to provide accessible coverage for all Americans. “The private sector has not shown any ability to provide…

  By Ray Suarez On Point (7/6/17) The most expensive, least efficient health care model in the developed world is ours. How did we get here? During debates over health care it was often said the U.S. has the best health care system in the world. But Americans are sicker, die younger, and pay more for care than their peers in other wealthy nations. There’s still an intense battle over the future of insurance. How did we get here? This hour On Point: The road Americans took to an expensive and inefficient system. Is it too late to change course? Guests…

  By Ryan Grim Action Network (6/27/17) You may remember a few months ago I said that I was co-founding an independent progressive publishing house, called Strong Arm Press. Well today we’re publishing our first book, Out of the Ooze: The Story of Dr. Tom Price, written by the great Alexander Zaitchik, who is the author of a terrific and brutal biography of Glenn Beck that you may have read a few years ago. [Common Nonsense: Glenn Beck and the Triumph of Ignorance.] We’re going to try to drive Out of the Ooze up to number one on the Amazon charts…

The Clock Is Running Out, Dems Time To Go Bold For All American Families By Julia Conley Common Dreams (6/27/17) Speaking to The Wall Street Journal, Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts is calling on Democrats to embrace a single-payer healthcare system in order to win back Congress and the White House in upcoming elections. Warren argued that simply blocking the Republican rollback of the Affordable Care Act, also called Obamacare, is not enough to distinguish Democrats from their GOP counterparts in the minds of voters. “President Obama tried to move us forward with health-care coverage,” Warren said, “by using a conservative model…