watercress words by Dr Aletha

I’ve started a series of blog posts that review each major party’s platform on healthcare and related issues. I take this information directly from the website of each party’s platform and include the link so you can read the complete document.

We’ve already looked at the parties’ views on gun violence and control. This post will look at health insurance. This is not a commentary or an opinion piece, you can find that elsewhere. This is information for your decision.

Every office holder or candidate may or may not fully subscribe to their party’s platform. Whether you are registered as a Republican, Democrat, Independent, or some other party, ultimately you will vote for a person. Do your research and learn what that person stands for.

Note: the photos are for illustration, are not affiliated with the party platform, and are not intended to influence your opinion.

The Republican Party Platform

This party platform was adopted in 2016, reffirmed in 2020, with plans for a new platform in 2024.

Restoring Patient Control and Preserving Quality in Healthcare

Any honest agenda for improving healthcare must start with repeal of the dishonestly named Affordable Care Act of 2010: Obamacare. It weighs like the dead hand of the past upon American medicine.

It imposed a Euro-style bureaucracy to manage its unworkable, budget-busting, conflicting provisions. It has driven up prices for all consumers. Their insurance premiums have dramatically increased while their deductibles have risen about eight times faster than wages in the last ten years.

It drove up drug prices by levying a $27 billion tax on manufacturers and importers and, through mandated price cuts for drugs under Medicare and Medicaid, forced pharmaceutical companies to raise prices for everyone else.

Its “silver plans,” the most common option on the government insurance exchanges, limit people’s access to their own doctor through narrow networks and restrict drug coverage, forcing many patients to pay for extremely costly medicines for their chronic diseases.

We agree with the four dissenting judges of the Supreme Court:

“In our view, the entire Act before us is invalid in its entirety.”
four Supreme Court justices

It must be removed and replaced with an approach based on genuine competition, patient choice, excellent care, wellness, and timely access to treatment.

an open paper planner lying on a laptop keyboard; the words HEALTH INSURANCE are spelled out with small tiles on the planner — Photo by Olya Kobruseva on Pexels.com

Congress to repeal the Affordable Care Act

To that end, a Republican president, on the first day in office, will use legitimate waiver authority under the law to halt its advance and then, with the unanimous support of Congressional Republicans, will sign its repeal.

The Supreme Court upheld Obamacare based on Congress’ power to tax. It is time to repeal Obamacare and give America a much-needed tax cut.

Our goal is to ensure that all Americans have improved access to affordable, high-quality healthcare, including those struggling with mental illness.

a female physician talking to a male patient — FROM LIGHTSTOCK.COM, AFFILIATE LINK

In its place we must combine what worked best in the past with changes needed for the future.

We must recover the traditional patient-physician relationship based on mutual trust, informed consent, and confidentiality.

To simplify the system for both patients and providers, we will reduce mandates and enable insurers and providers of care to increase healthcare options and contain costs.

State regulation of insurance markets

We will return to the states their historic role of regulating local insurance markets, limit federal requirements on both private insurance and Medicaid, and call on state officials to reconsider the costly medical mandates, imposed under their own laws, that price millions of low-income families out of the insurance market.

Medicaid block grants

To guarantee first-rate care for the needy, we propose to block grant Medicaid and other payments and to assist all patients, including those with pre-existing conditions, to obtain coverage in a robust consumer market.

Flexible and portable health plans

We believe that individuals with preexisting conditions who maintain continuous coverage should be protected from discrimination.

Today’s highly mobile workforce needs portability of insurance coverage that can go with them from job to job. The need to maintain coverage should not dictate where families have to live and work.

shallow focus of woman and 2 men working in a call center — Photo by Mikhail Nilov on Pexels.com

We propose to end tax discrimination against the individual purchase of insurance and allow consumers to buy insurance across state lines. In light of that, we propose repealing the 1945 McCarran-Ferguson Act which protects insurance companies from anti-trust litigation.

We look to the growth of Health Savings Accounts and Health Reimbursement Accounts that empower patientand advance choice in healthcare.

exploring the HEART of healthcare

I appreciate your interest in the politics of healthcare, an issue that is vital to all of us every day. These proposals will become more focussed and debated as election day approaches; the national election is Tuesday November 8, 2022. Please exercise your right to vote, I intend to.

Medical stethoscope and heart on a textured background

Dr Aletha

The Democratic Party- “Universal Health Care”

Democrats will keep up the fight until all Americans can access secure, affordable, high-quality health insurance—because as Democrats, we fundamentally believe health care is a right for all, not a privilege for the few.

by Aletha Cress Oglesby, M.D. July 11, 2022August 20, 2022

Dr. Aletha

Ending the Epidemic of Gun Violence

(From the section-“Healing the Soul of America”)

“Gun violence is a public health crisis in the United States. Over 100,000 people are shot and nearly 40,000 people die annually from guns—devastating countless families, friends, and communities. We can and will make gun violence a thing of the past.

Addressing the gun violence crisis requires supporting evidence-based programs that prevent gun deaths from occurring in the first place, including by making mental health care more accessible and supporting suicide reduction initiatives, funding interventions to reduce homicides and gun violence in neighborhoods, and strengthening protections against domestic violence.

Democrats will also ensure the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have sufficient resources to study gun violence as a public health issue, including the ongoing health care, mental health, economic, and social costs that can affect survivors and their families for years.”

Democrats will

enact universal background checks,

end online sales of guns and ammunition,

close dangerous loopholes that currently allow stalkers, abusive partners, and some individuals convicted of assault or battery to buy and possess firearms,

and adequately fund the federal background check system.

We will close the “Charleston loophole” and prevent individuals who have been convicted of hate crimes from possessing firearms.

Democrats will ban the manufacture and sale of assault weapons and high capacity magazines.

We will incentivize states to enact licensing requirements for owning firearms and extreme risk protection order laws that allow courts to temporarily remove guns from the possession of those who are a danger to themselves or others.

We will pass legislation requiring that guns be safely stored in homes.

And Democrats believe that gun companies should be held responsible for their products, just like any other business, and will prioritize repealing the law that shields gun manufacturers from civil liability.