Republicans need to get over stubborn opposition to helping poor
Republican resistance to Medicaid expansion in the states prolongs racial disparity in health care.
Many called it socialized medicine. A rising Republican warned that we’d "spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it once was like in America when men were free.”
Donald Trump talking about Obamacare in 2015?
No, Ronald Reagan urging Congress to vote against the creation of Medicare.
This week marks 50 years since the passage of Medicare. If addressing inequality is a real priority for Republicans officials — particularly those in the South — they should take a cue from history, embrace the health law, and expand Medicaid.
Before Medicare, health care in America was highly segregated. African Americans went to the hospital far less often than white Americans, and when they were admitted, they were often treated to separate and substandard care.
The passage of Medicare brought the desegregation of southern hospitals. More than 1,000 hospitals were integrated in just under four months, and the disparities in health outcomes between black and white Americans shrank.
The passage of Medicare and Medicaid was the first breakthrough in access to health care for all.
But we have a long way to go. Just like in 1965, expanding Medicaid can reduce racial disparities in health care. The uninsured rate remains about 1.5 times higher for African Americans and almost three times higher for Latinos than white Americans. Access to affordable health care in America remains segregated along race and class lines, in large part because Republican governors and legislatures in most southern states have refused to expand Medicaid.
Over a third of African Americans who would otherwise be eligible for Medicaid reside in states that have refused to expand the program. And the House of Representatives has taken more than 50 votes to repeal, defund, or undermine the Affordable Care Act.
No law is perfect, yet we know that the ACA works, just like Medicare works.
Some 50 years later, a leading presidential candidate excoriated other presidential hopefuls for attacking Medicare.
No, Donald Trump in 2015.
On Medicare’s 50th birthday, Republican governors and legislators have a chance to learn from the past and be on the right side of history.
Sen. Sherrod Brown is a Democrat from Ohio. Sen. Tim Kaine is a Democrat from Virginia.
