John McCain was right: you can’t repeal the ACA without a plan to replace it.
Healthcare is a difficult issue to manage in a nation as large and as diverse as the United States. We made incremental improvements with the Affordable Care Act (a.k.a. ObamaCare) by creating a marketplace where families and individuals could compare plans and prices, expanding Medicaid eligibility, doing more to protect people with pre-existing conditions and establishing tax credits and cost-sharing subsidies to make health insurance more affordable, thereby expanding enrollment.
While these changes are controversial in some circles, the math is undeniable. Since 2020–a full ten years after ACA became law–enrollment through the marketplace in Florida has increased 134%. 4.1 million Floridians have enrolled in a plan so far this year. We’ve closed the gap on uninsured people in the state as well. In 2010, 14% of Floridians were without coverage. That number has narrowed to 11% as of the 2022 Census. Even as Florida’s population grew by 17% in that time period, the number of uninsured in the state decreased by 7%. That is an impressive statistic, especially when you consider that Florida is one of ten states that still hasn’t expanded Medicaid.
With the Biden administration’s recent passage of the Inflation Reduction Act, the American people scored a huge win in the fight for affordable prescription drugs. For the first time in U.S. history, the government can now negotiate directly with drug companies and improve access and costs on “single-source brand-name Medicare Part B and Part D drugs.” The law also requires pharmaceutical companies that raise their drug prices faster than the price of inflation to pay Medicare a rebate. President Biden deserves a massive amount of credit for this legislation. Floridians who need important drugs like insulin are no longer subject to the cruel whims of people like Pharma Bro, which have been fleecing Americans in need for years.
Meanwhile back at home in Florida, Governor DeSantis has been reducing coverage access for people in need. He has recently sued to end KidCare, a program built for families just above the Medicaid threshold, resulting in over 22,000 Florida children losing health care in 2024. He also kicked children off of Chip, another program helping low-income families.
You might be in the camp that doesn’t think health care is a right in this country, and thus you believe in our employer-centric health care system that creates a barrier to health care access if you are unemployed. That is your right, but remember this: 66% of bankruptcies in the United States are caused by medical debt. That’s 530,000 cases per year that could be avoided with improved access to coverage for more Americans. The bill is coming due one way or the other when it comes to providing healthcare to everyone in the United States. Governor DeSantis and the MAGA Republicans are doing it in the worst and cruelest way possible.
John McCain was right. While the ACA isn’t perfect, the Republicans have no plan to fill the gaps in health coverage that would result if the law was successfully repealed. Vote for me on November 5th so we can create a more compassionate Florida.
