Washington Post: Americans Are Starting to Suffer from Trump’s Health-Care Sabotage
In the year since they failed to pass TrumpCare, President Trump and Congressional Republicans have been relentless in their efforts to sabotage the Affordable Care Act. (Click here for a rundown of the ways that Republicans are undermining the law.) Over the weekend, the Washington Post Editorial Board had some harsh criticism for the GOP over how their efforts are leaving millions of Americans uninsured and raising health care costs for millions more. Key excerpts:
“…The effects of the president’s underinformed instincts, enabled by the ideologues in his administration, are beginning to show up in some of the numbers, representing real pain that Americans are suffering for Mr. Trump’s deficient leadership.”
“The Commonwealth Fund, a nonprofit foundation focused on health-care issues, announced last week that the rate of working-age Americans without health insurance in the group’s annual survey rose to 15.5 percent, up about three percentage points since 2016.”
“…The numbers suggest that the critics’ sabotage efforts are to blame. After impressive declines during President Barack Obama’s second term, the fund found that the uninsured rate increased in both of the years Mr. Trump has been in office. During the campaign, Mr. Trump regularly complained that the Affordable Care Act (ACA) left too many Americans uncovered. The result of nearly a year and a half of Mr. Trump’s leadership is 4 million people added to that group.”
“But Commonwealth Fund analysts noted that, rather than fixing the law’s problems, Republicans have done concrete things to worsen them. ‘These include the administration’s deep cuts in advertising and outreach during the marketplace open-enrollment periods, a shorter open enrollment period, and other actions that collectively may have left people with a general sense of confusion about the status of the law,’ they wrote.”
“Former health and human services secretary Tom Price, an architect of the GOP’s anti-Obamacare campaign, admitted last week that repealing the law’s requirement that all Americans carry health coverage means that ‘you’ll likely have individuals who are younger and healthier not participating in that market, and consequently that drives up the cost for other folks within that market.’ Indeed, the fund found that 5 percent of non-elderly adults plan to drop coverage in response to the mandate repeal. That number may seem small, but if it is younger and healthier people dropping out, it will raise costs for everyone else.”
“The Commonwealth Fund, a nonprofit foundation focused on health-care issues, announced last week that the rate of working-age Americans without health insurance in the group’s annual survey rose to 15.5 percent, up about three percentage points since 2016.”
“…The numbers suggest that the critics’ sabotage efforts are to blame. After impressive declines during President Barack Obama’s second term, the fund found that the uninsured rate increased in both of the years Mr. Trump has been in office. During the campaign, Mr. Trump regularly complained that the Affordable Care Act (ACA) left too many Americans uncovered. The result of nearly a year and a half of Mr. Trump’s leadership is 4 million people added to that group.”
“But Commonwealth Fund analysts noted that, rather than fixing the law’s problems, Republicans have done concrete things to worsen them. ‘These include the administration’s deep cuts in advertising and outreach during the marketplace open-enrollment periods, a shorter open enrollment period, and other actions that collectively may have left people with a general sense of confusion about the status of the law,’ they wrote.”
“Former health and human services secretary Tom Price, an architect of the GOP’s anti-Obamacare campaign, admitted last week that repealing the law’s requirement that all Americans carry health coverage means that ‘you’ll likely have individuals who are younger and healthier not participating in that market, and consequently that drives up the cost for other folks within that market.’ Indeed, the fund found that 5 percent of non-elderly adults plan to drop coverage in response to the mandate repeal. That number may seem small, but if it is younger and healthier people dropping out, it will raise costs for everyone else.”