The Declaration of Independence says that, We the People are endowed with “unalienable Rights” of Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. But the people’s Life, Liberty, and Happiness are dependent upon health care and safety.Do “We the People” want to go where Republicans want to take us?Republican ProposalsThe new national policies being proposed by Republicans include big cuts in health and safety programs leaving millions uninsured.1The NY Times reports:A bill to dismantle the Affordable Care Act that narrowly passed the House this month would increase the projected number of people without health insurance by 14 million next year and by 23 million in 2026, the Congressional Budget Office said Wednesday. That 10-year figure is slightly less than originally estimated.It would reduce the federal deficit by $119 billion over a decade, less than the $150 billion in savings projected in late March for an earlier version of the bill. And in states that seek waivers from rules mandating essential health coverage, the new law could make insurance economically out of reach for some sick consumers.“Premiums would vary significantly according to health status and the types of benefits provided, and less healthy people would face extremely high premiums,” the budget office concluded.2Concern is also being raised that there will be a Republican push in the Congress for fast action.“The effort to take health insurance from the middle class and poor and funnel the savings into tax cuts for the rich is a little like mold. It grows best in the dark.That’s why Republican leaders in the House handled their bill as they did. They did not hold a single hearing, because they knew that attention would have been devastating.”3The Republican budget for 2018 reduces federal funding for coverage of children in Medicaid and CHIP (nearly 4 in ten children) nationwide.4

GOP Health Plan card; image courtesy of www.usmessageboard.com.

Republicans have worked to sabotage the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act for years. As a law professor notes in the New York Times:“Obamacare is not “collapsing under its own weight,” as Republicans are so fond of saying. It was sabotaged from the day it was enacted. And now the Republican Party should be held accountable not only for any potential replacement of the law, but also for having tried to starve it to death.The Congressional Budget Office on Wednesday released its accounting of the House Republicans’ replacement bill for the Affordable Care Act, and the numbers are not pretty: It is projected to leave 23 million more Americans uninsured over 10 years, through deep cuts to insurance subsidies and Medicaid. The report underscores how the bill would cut taxes for the rich to take health care away from the less well-off.The A.C.A. is not perfect, and improvements to it would be welcome. But it worked in many respects and would have worked much better had Congress been a faithful guardian of the law….A caretaking Congress would have fixed what wasn’t working. Instead, opponents did everything possible to shut off all the A.C.A.’s financing — starvation intended to wreak havoc in the insurance markets and to make it falsely appear that the A.C.A.was collapsing because it was just bad policy.The irony is that the A.C.A. was vulnerable to this strategy because the Democrats had tried to compromise with the Republicans in an ultimately unsuccessful effort to build bipartisan support for the law. If the Democrats had instead enacted a single-payer policy — such as Medicare for all — the entire health care system would have been in the hands of the federal government, instead of dependent on the states and private insurers.”5One measure of outcomes associated with health, safety, and happiness is Life Expectancy. The U.S. does not compare well with other similar nations. And since 1980, when Reagan was elected, Life Expectancy in the U.S.A. has not kept up with improvements in other similar countries.6An examination of Life Expectancy in Democratic Blue States and Republican Red States finds people in Blue States generally have better Life Expectancies in the U.S.A. A summary analysis shows the following rankings.7Life Expectancy Ranking of States in 2015Sixteen Blue States and Nine Red States Ranked Among 25 Best States in Life ExpectancyHI 1stCA 2ndCT 3rdMN 4thMA 5thNY 6thCO 7thNJ 8thWA 9thNH 10thVT 12thRI 14thOR 17thMD 22ndIL 24thME 25th* - No Medicaid ExpansionUT 11th - No Medicaid ExpansionFL 13th - No Medicaid ExpansionWI 15th - No Medicaid ExpansionAZ 16thND 18thSD 19th - No Medicaid ExpansionNE 20th - No Medicaid ExpansionIowa 21stID 23rd - No Medicaid ExpansionFour Blue States and Twenty-One Red States Ranked Among 25 Worst States in Life ExpectancyVA 26th - No Medicaid ExpansionDE 27th*NV 34th*NM 35th*AK 28th*MT 29th*PA 30th*TX 31st* - No Medicaid ExpansionKS 32nd* - No Medicaid ExpansionWY 33rd* - No Medicaid ExpansionMI 36th*NC 37th* - No Medicaid ExpansionOH 38th*MO 39th* - No Medicaid ExpansionGA 40th* - No Medicaid ExpansionIN 41st*SC 42nd* - No Medicaid ExpansionTN 43rd* - No Medicaid ExpansionAR 44th*KY 45th*OK 46th* - No Medicaid ExpansionLA 47th*WV 48th*AL 49th* - No Medicaid ExpansionMS 50th* - No Medicaid ExpansionNote: Asterisk identifies States that also have worse than the National Average Number of Deaths per 100K People for All Causes (786 in 2014). Detailed analysis is in spreadsheet form.8Empowering We the People We have information tools to help citizens persuade their current elected federal office holders. Interactive maps can provide citizens with facts they can use to be more effective.Data on motor vehicle deaths for each year (2002 - 2015) by Congressional District are available.9Hopefully, enough members of Congress can be persuaded by We the People, armed with the deadly facts, to steer a more humane course for America.

References:

1. https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/trump-to-propose-big-cuts-to-safety-net-in-new-budget-this-week/2017/05/21/62c01f44-3e34-11e7-adba-394ee67a7582_story.html?utm_term=.848b3f4fc60e

2. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/24/us/politics/cbo-congressional-budget-office-health-care.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news

3. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/23/opinion/health-care-bill-senate.html

4. http://files.kff.org/attachment/Fact-Sheet-Presidents-2018-Budget-Proposal-Reduces-Federal-Funding-for-Coverage-of-Children-in-Medicaid-and-CHIP

5. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/25/opinion/republicans-obamacare-aca.html?action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=opinion-c-col-right-region&region=opinion-c-col-right-region&WT.nav=opinion-c-col-right-region

6. http://www.healthsystemtracker.org/chart-collection/u-s-life-expectancy-compare-countries/?utm_campaign=KFF-2016-The-Latest&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=52353134&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-9wdFy72apuo7rwz0Fnfkbi705TTA48vxGO45mJxsi3MPC_SW9CFzVFZHiDhBfTeLyndL6bXsb23HX5WA3MHJBAUo9c1uaBcmPEbRi4Mo3fblMUlfs&_hsmi=52353134

7. https://www.careforcrashvictims.com/blog/where-are-we-going-blue-and-red-state-rankings-by-life-expectancy/

8. https://www.careforcrashvictims.com/wp-content//uploads/sites/3/2017/05/FATALITYRatesLife-ExpectancyUninsuredMedicaidSheet1OnePagePortrait.pdf

9. https://www.careforcrashvictims.com/home/crash-death-mapping-tools/