Medicare-for-all would be a disaster for our healthcare system as a whole, but how might it affect individual Americans with life-threatening conditions?
The Daily Signal sat down for an interview with Congressman Jim Hagedorn of Minnesota, who is fighting kidney cancer. As he explained to the interviewer, the medicine currently saving his life isn't even available in countries with nationalized medicine like the United Kingdom.
Hagedorn: I think of all of our institutions of medicine in the United States, really when you look at Medicare for All and things like the public option, that’s going to put more and more people on government insurance and government insurance reimburses our doctors and hospitals at a lower rate.
Usually for Medicaid it’s about 25 cents on the dollar. Medicare up at about 40 cents. But the way hospitals and doctors make up the difference is they have people on private insurance that come in and pay more.
And so Medicare for All public options is going to lead to more and more of this government and it’s going to take away, ultimately, health insurance from people who get it through the private sector—180 million people, that’s not good.
It’s going to take money out of the system for our doctors and hospitals. That’s not good. That’s going to degrade care.
It’s going to force people to have longer waiting systems. We’re going to end up like they are in many other countries like Canada and the United Kingdom.
I bring up the United Kingdom because the drug regimen that I’m on that was approved by the FDA within the last year, that’s not even available in the United Kingdom. They rejected it due to cost. And so there are lots of people around the world who are suffering, not even able to get the most advanced treatment because of socialism.
And then on top of all that, when you look at the difference between socialists’ systems of medicine and our free market system, which is, unfortunately, very bureaucratic and highly regulated—some of that due to Obamacare—but the difference is a person in my situation can get diagnosed by a specialist and receive treatment within weeks.
In these socialist countries, it can be months and months. And often by the time the treatment starts it’s too late. It’s just terrible.
It's just a matter of time before big-government politicians take control of Congress and the White House and attempt to ram Medicare-for-all down the throats of the American people. We never thought Obamacare was possible until it happened, and now even Republican politicians don't have the courage to repeal it.
We need a constitutional firewall against socialist programs, and that's exactly what we can put in place with a Convention of States.
An Article V Convention of States is called and controlled by the states and has the power to propose constitutional amendments that limit the power and jurisdiction of the federal government. These amendments can expressly forbid Washington from legislating on any topic not mentioned in the Constitution, including healthcare.
With these kinds of amendments in place (once 38 states ratify), the federal government will be forever prohibited from instituting programs like Medicare-for-all. We won't have to worry any more about who controls the White House, Congress, or the Supreme Court -- all three branches will be forced back into their constitutional boxes.
Over four million Americans and fifteen states have joined the Article V movement. Will you be next? Sign the Convention of States petition below!
