President Trump used the power of the pen to issue executive orders to take away the healthcare of the poor this week. He did this by removing subsidies offered to enrollees that couldn’t afford the high premiums and deductibles that are currently available in the marketplace.
Instead of working with Congress to provide increased protections for Americans from excessively high premiums and deductibles, the President has decided to throw the health insurance exchanges into chaos, which will undoubtedly cost people their access to healthcare.
And, to make matters worse, the health insurance companies have been making record profits as their stock prices have increased steadily since the passage of Obamacare. (See the above graph)
Without significant protections for Americans and any capacity to bring down the cost of prescription drugs, it’s the American people that will be footing the bill for this misadventure.
Yes, these subsidies are paid to these very health insurance companies. However, without these subsidies and without sufficient protections applied to the companies, the health and wellbeing of the country is at stake.
That’s unacceptable to me and should be to any member of Congress.
Some people want a single payer, or Medicare for all plan. Others want to repeal Obamacare altogether. Both of these approaches don’t solve the impending crisis facing real people that need their healthcare today.
We have to fix Obamacare today and work toward better solutions for the long term. That’s what Americans have deserved for decades and haven’t seen in far too long.
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