A Guide to the President’s Proposed (and Politicized) Health Care Plans President Donald J. Trump and First Lady Melania Trump meet with survivors, families, hospital staff, and first responders, Wednesday, August 7, 2019, at Miami Valley Hospital in Dayton, Ohio. (Photo Credit: Official White House Photo by Andrea Hanks, Public Domain) … [Read more...]
Patient Advocate Groups Suing Trump Administration Following Health Plan Changes
Patient and advocacy groups are suing the Trump administration following a decision to extend the availability of short-term health plans. The change is one of many being made by President Trump in an attempt to limit the effectiveness of ObamaCare. This and other recent decisions made by President Trump are likely to significantly impact health … [Read more...]
Sessions Attacks Pre-Existing Conditions
Jeff Sessions’ announcement last week that the Justice Department would sign on to a Texas-led, 20-state lawsuit arguing a federal court should allow insurance companies to deny healthcare coverage to millions of Americans with pre-existing conditions who are subsidized by The Affordable Care Act—or force them to pay prohibitive prices for … [Read more...]
Blue States Try to Replace Obamacare Individual Tax Mandate; Red States Seek to Offer Stripped-Down Versions
Just before Christmas, the Republican tax plan that slashed rates on corporations also duplicitously repealed the “individual mandate,” the Obamacare tax that allows the federal government to fine people who don’t have their health insurance, leaving a lump of coal in the Christmas stockings of middle-class Americans, who count on a pool of both … [Read more...]
Federal Judges Halt Trump’s Attempt to Destroy Obamacare No-Cost Birth Control Mandate
President Trump succeeded in killing The Affordable Care Act’s “individual mandate” via the new tax law’s provision eliminating penalties for Americans who choose not to purchase health insurance, starting in 2019. However, Trump failed to enact the so-called moral and religious- exemption rules that would have quashed Obamacare’s no-cost birth … [Read more...]
Seeking New Ways to Cut Healthcare Costs
Republicans have revivified their efforts, yet again, to kill or weaken Obamacare in any way possible. Trump recently signed an executive order that he claimed would help save healthcare and he announced that the federal government would no longer be issuing payments to insurance companies to help reduce the price of insurance for low-income … [Read more...]
The Unceasing Effort to Repeal Obamacare
After the defeat in July, it seemed the attempt to squash Obamacare was dead in the water, but it would appear, in light of recent events, the “repeal and replace” effort has zombie like features. Prior to its defeat, the Graham-Cassidy bill jutted forth into the spotlight as Republicans scrambled to get the 50 votes necessary for Senate approval … [Read more...]
AHCA Could Make Bouncing From Job to Job Even Harder
In the past decade or so it has become increasingly common for working class Americans to move from job to job. This is a function of larger changes in the economy that governmental policy has tried to work around. The Affordable Care Act, for example, offers health care options for people in this very situation. For people who are bouncing between … [Read more...]
Cutting Medicaid Could Hollow Out Addiction Treatment Programs
Ever since OxyContin hit the market in 1996, the opioid epidemic has caused extreme turmoil. In 2015, 33,000 people died as a result of opioid-related overdoses. And of the 20.5 million people suffering from substance abuse in that year, 2 million were addicted to opioid pain relievers. The crisis didn’t emerge out of a vacuum. In the late 1990s, … [Read more...]
American Leaders Become Increasingly Separated From Everyday People
In early April, United Airlines made headlines after a team of security officers dragged a man off a plane for refusing to leave his seat. The airline asked the man to leave because of a policy (shared by other airlines) that essentially allows for passengers to be kicked off a flight when the plane is overbooked. The incident was caught on several … [Read more...]
