Tag: Kamala Harris

Vice President Harris wants to forgive medical debt
Vice President Kamala Harris’s economic plan calls for forgiving medical debt for as many as 15 million Americans, reports Annie Nova for CNBC. Americans should not go bankrupt because they need medical care, says Harris. She wants to erase much of the more than $220 billion in medical debt.

Harris’ campaign has not laid out any of the details for how she would cancel medical debt. For sure, the government would need to be involved. Today, about 14 million Americans owe at least $1,000 in medical debt. The American Rescue Plan, which became law during the Covid pandemic, provides local governments with the ability to buy and cancel nearly $7 billion in medical debt by December 2026 for about three million Americans.

A majority of Americans (51 percent) believe it is very important for our government to forgive medical debt. Medical debt drives inequities in society and creates impediments to prosperity. It also can deter people from getting further medical care. Older adults alone owe more than $54 billion in medical debt.

Donald Trump has never suggested that he would cancel medical debt. He simply has called for more health care price transparency. And, he has called for repeal of the Affordable Care Act, which has reduced the number of uninsured Americans by more than 20 million and prevents insurers from denying health insurance coverage to people with pre-existing conditions. The Congressional Budget Office found that repealing the Affordable Care Act would quickly lead to 27 million Americans losing their insurance coverage and those with insurance coverage seeing their premiums doubled.

The Biden Administration has been working to eliminate medical debt from people’s credit reports. And, medical debt under $500 is no longer appearing on people’s credit reports. Vice President Harris wants to eliminate all medical debt from people’s credit reports.

In an interview with Ady Barkan about health care, Harris says “Access to health care should be a human right.” She describes the lunch at which her mom told her that she had been diagnosed with colon cancer and the inhumanity of our health care system, which is so expensive and challenging to navigate.

Here’s more from Just Care:
August 28, 2024
Harris and Walz: “We’re not going back!” on Medicare and Social Security
Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, Governor Tim Walz, have proclaimed, “We’re not going back!” Seniors and our families agree. We are definitely not going back on Social Security, Medicare, or drug prices. Rather, we are going forward. Forward to expanded Social Security, expanded Medicare, and lower drug prices.

We’re not going back to half of all seniors with below-poverty incomes. Before Social Security, people worked as long as they could, but the fast pace of many jobs “wears out its workers with great rapidity,” a commentator noted in 1912. “The young, the vigorous, the adaptable, the supple of limb, the alert of mind, are in demand,” he explained. “Middle age is old age.”

Once a job was lost, an older worker could seldom find a new one. Parents, as they aged, routinely moved in with their adult children. Those who had no children or whose children were unable or unwilling to support them wound up in the poorhouse. Literally. The poorhouse was not some ancient Dickensian invention; it was a very real means of subsistence for elderly people in the world before Social Security.

We are going forward. Forward to expanded Social Security, expanded Medicare, and lower drug prices.

When Social Security became law, every state but New Mexico had poorhouses. The vast majority of the residents were elderly. Most of the “inmates,” as they were generally labeled, entered the poorhouse late in life, having been independent wage earners until that point. In 1910, a Massachusetts Commission found that 92 percent of the residents entered after age 60.

The poorhouse was a fate to be dreaded. Even in as progressive a state as New York, the conditions were abysmal. In 1930, the New York State Commission on Old Age Security found that “worthy people are thrown together with whatever dregs of society happen to need the institution’s shelter at the moment…Privacy, even in the most intimate affairs of life, is impossible; married couples are quite generally separated; and all the inmates are regimented as though in a prison or penal colony.”

A return to that may seem impossible, but it is not. If Social Security did not exist today, more than forty percent of those aged 65 and over would once again have below-poverty incomes.

We’re not going back! Before Social Security, the death of one parent frequently meant the breakup of a family. Orphanages housed children with a living parent who had been unable to afford them, when the other parent died. People who became disabled and could no longer work routinely could be found begging in the street.

Those families now have guaranteed monthly benefits, thanks to Social Security, which lifts almost a million children and more than 5.3 million adults between the ages of 18 and 65 out of poverty. And our Social Security system lessens the depth of poverty for millions more.

Republicans want to take us back. They want to end Medicare as we know it.

But Republican politicians want to take us back. They have put out plans that not only would cut Social Security, but end it as we know it. We cannot let them take us back.

Instead of going backwards, we can and must go forward. Vice President Kamala Harris and her Democratic Party have plans to expand Social Security for seniors, for those with disabilities and for families experiencing the death of a provider.

In fact, when Harris was in the Senate, she was an original cosponsor of the Social Security Expansion Act, and when her running mate, Governor Tim Walz, was in the House of Representatives, he was an original cosponsor of the Social Security 2100 Act. Both bills expand benefits across-the-board, update the cost of living adjustment, so benefits don’t erode over time, expand benefits in other important ways, and ensure that those benefits can be paid on time and in full for the foreseeable future, by requiring the uber-wealthy to pay their fair share.

And we’re not going back to a time without guaranteed government-provided health insurance for seniors and people with disabilities. Before President Lyndon Johnson signed Medicare and Medicaid into law in 1965, most seniors were not able to find health insurance at any cost. For those who could, the coverage was inadequate and the cost was exorbitant.

We can and must go forward. Harris and her Democratic colleagues want to expand Medicare. The essential benefits of vision, hearing and dental services must be added and the need for supplemental insurance must be eliminated. And Medicare should be extended to children and all ages in between.

We’re not going back to Big Pharma ripping off Medicare beneficiaries. For years, politicians promised to rein in Big Pharma and empower Medicare to negotiate lower prescription drug prices. The Biden-Harris administration got it done.

If you too are determined to not go back on these important freedoms, the choice in November is clear.

Republicans want to take us back. They want to end Medicare as we know it. They want to replace it with vouchers, forcing seniors to fend for themselves in a hostile marketplace. Additionally, they have promised to repeal the Inflation Reduction Act and let Big Pharma charge whatever outrageously high prescription drug prices they decide. We’re not going back to Medicare beneficiaries paying more than $35 per month out-of-pocket for insulin. We’re not going back to Medicare beneficiaries paying more than $2,000 out-of-pocket per year for Medicare Part D prescription drug spending.

Instead, we will go forward to a future of even lower prices for even more prescription drugs. And that future must include providing those lower prices for all Americans.

We’re not going back to a world without the Affordable Care Act. We’re not going back to a world without Medicaid expansion, without coverage for “pre-existing conditions.”

That is just some of what is at stake in November.

We’re not going back to a world where Republicans hand out tax breaks to billionaires. We want to protect Social Security and expand benefits, paid for by requiring billionaires and other uber-wealthy to pay their fair share.

Social Security Works is proud to stand with Vice President Kamala Harris and Governor Walz in the fight for freedom. The freedom to retire with dignity and independence. The freedom to get the medical care we need. The freedom to get the drugs our doctors prescribe.

If you too are determined to not go back on these important freedoms, the choice in November is clear. Let’s unite and usher in a future that takes us forward together.

Here’s more from Just Care:
August 14, 2024
With Medicare for All, Bernie Sanders moved the Democratic Party left
Osita Nwanevu reports for the New Yorker on how Senator Bernie Sanders has single-handedly moved the Democratic Party left on health care with his vision of Medicare for All. Medicare for All would improve traditional Medicare to fill all coverage gaps, add important benefits including home and nursing home care, allow people to continue to use the doctors and hospitals they want to use and eliminate all out-of-pocket health care costs. Virtually all presidential candidates now include at least a Medicare option in their health care reform proposals.

To be clear, a Medicare option, sometimes called a “public option,” recognizes the value of public insurance at reining in costs and guaranteeing people health care, but keeps private insurance as an option for people as well, thereby failing to bring down costs adequately or ensure people access to care. Only Medicare for All delivers affordable care to all. It does not ration care based on ability to pay.

Some Democratic presidential candidates see Medicare for All as “bad” policy, including John Delaney. He appears to object to “free health care” because he thinks it is the wrong message for Democrats to be sending out. He appears to be OK with limiting access to care based on costs.

Delaney proposes a universal public program that would not meet people’s basic needs. He would offer people a public plan with gaps in coverage. People could buy private supplemental coverage to fill gaps in the public plan. One question is how his plan would ensure people do not find themselves broke or being donned by collection agencies because their out-of-pocket costs are unaffordable. Another question is how his plan would be paid for.

Mayor Pete Buttigieg wants you to believe that his plan to allow people to buy into Medicare–the public option–will ultimately mean that private plans will wither on the vine. I once believed that as well. Then, I saw how Medicare Advantage plans, which were billed as less costly than traditional Medicare, have been ripping off taxpayers by overcharging for their services, while being engaged in what the Office of the Inspector General calls widespread denials of care and coverage. Still, the Medicare Advantage plans have been working with the Trump administration’s Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to steer people into their plans.

Senator Kamala Harris aims to let people transition to a public or private Medicare plan over ten years. However, her plan does nothing to address the $503 billion a year in administrative expense that private plans bring to our health care system. It does nothing to prevent gaming by Medicare Advantage plans; Harris has no answer as to how she plans to hold them accountable. And, it does nothing to guarantee Americans affordable care.

Morning Consult reported last month that 55 percent of Americans support Medicare for All once they understand that they can continue to use the doctors and hospitals they want to use. Its poll of 1,472 voters, taken between June 29 and July 2, found that 56 percent of Independents support Medicare for All if they are told they can continue to use their doctors and hospitals.

Americans need to have faith that the new public plan they would get through Medicare for All is better than the plan they currently have through their employer. Given how many people can’t wait to get on Medicare, which offers less generous benefits at greater cost than Medicare for All, it simply should be a matter of time before the vast majority of Americans support Medicare for All. None of the other health care reform options would ensure health care affordability for all Americans.

If you support Medicare for all, please let Congress know. Sign this petition.

Here’s more from Just Care:
August 7, 2019
KamalaCare leaves health insurers running the show
There’s no question that the American health care system is a crazy quilt that leaves health “insurance companies in charge,” as Senator Kamala Harris appreciates. Unfortunately, her health reform proposal, “KamalaCare” does not match her rhetoric. It leaves health insurers running the show.

Harris’ proposal relies extensively on for-profit health insurers to provide coverage. But, they are the reason health care is unaffordable and the reason people are often faced with denials of care and coverage. She claims her plan will hold the health insurers to account if they game the system. That sounds great in theory, but how exactly would it work in practice?

Like Senator Bernie Sanders’ and Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal’s Medicare for All legislation, Harris’ proposal makes an improved traditional Medicare public plan available to all Americans. Unlike Sanders and Jayapal, after a ten-year transition, she keeps the for-profit health insurance industry in business, offering Medicare Advantage plan options to people who want a private plan.

Harris does not explain what her multi-payer plan would do to reduce the $503 billion a year in administrative costs in our health care system. She also does not explain how it will rein in doctor and hospital rates. She does say that she would cut prescription drug prices so that we pay what other wealthy countries pay for our drugs. And, while that could save as much as $250 billion a year, it is not the hundreds of additional billions in savings we achieve from the Sanders and Jayapal Medicare for All bills.

Consequently, it is hard to see how Harris makes health care affordable. Today, annual out-of-pocket limits in Medicare Advantage plans are $5,059 for in-network care alone. What would change?

Putting costs aside, like many other pundits and candidates, Harris believes that people want health insurance plan choices more than they want affordable health care. But, in my entire professional career, I’ve never met anyone who said they cared about having the choice of commercial insurance plans. To the contrary, they don’t like making that choice. The choice we all want is the choice of doctors and hospitals we want to use at an affordable price.

Moreover, Harris fails to explain why private insurers will be any more accountable under her proposal than they are today–largely unaccountable. She does not seem to realize that Medicare Advantage plans, from their inception, have failed to comply with many of their contractual obligations, threatening the health and safety of their members; and, the federal government has lacked the power to punish them effectively, let alone to get them to comply with their legal obligations.

Medicare Advantage plans can’t even manage to provide their enrollees with up-to-date provider directories. They engage in widespread denials of care and payment, according to the US Office of the Inspector General. And, they won’t turn over data, required by law, that would reveal the services they provide their members to allow an independent assessment as to whether they are meeting their members’ needs.

Federal audits of Medicare Advantage plans have not helped to keep Medicare Advantage plans in line. Short of a provision in the law that either held Medicare Advantage CEO’s personally liable for failures to comply with the law or put them out of business for failing to comply, how exactly will Harris’ proposal induce them to behave properly? Or, is Harris prepared to call for these severe penalties?

If not, what is she thinking? Other wealthy countries manage to guarantee health care to everyone at half the cost we pay, and they rely on private insurers. But, for the most part, their insurers are non-profit. And, the insurers are regulated like utilities. It feels like a fantasy to believe that our for-profit, shareholder-accountable, health insurers are going to behave any differently than they behave today. They have money and power, which they will continue to wield to make sure they can operate without accountability.

In sum, 200 economists have united behind Sanders’ and Jayapal’s Medicare for All single-payer proposals because Medicare for All saves money and guarantees affordable health care to all. Harris’ health care reform proposal introduces new rules for private health plans without any meaningful cost savings or insurer accountability. Regardless of what Harris believes, her health reform proposal will not give people the affordable health care they want and need.

Here’s more from Just Care:
August 1, 2019