Obama’s Affordable Care Act had intentions to solve American healthcare, yet people still have many gripes with the system. Moreover, 45 percent of U.S. adults ages 19 to 64 are inadequately insured, and although fewer adults are uninsured, more are underinsured. It goes without saying that this broken system is unacceptable for a first-world, developed country like America. Americans deserve affordable and sufficient health care coverage, which will be done by implementing a Single Payer Healthcare System. When this passes, coverage will be mandated for all medically necessary services, insurance will be universal, patients will no longer be susceptible to insurance companies’ unfair policies, and citizens will no longer have to pay for out-of-pocket fees nor premiums. America has the ability to harbor a healthcare system that can aid countless families in their medical needs. There is no excuse for having a non-functioning healthcare system when we can increase taxes on the ultra-wealthy and provide for payments for one public agency that oversees all health insurance in the country. The world of premiums, high administrative costs, a lack of price control, and deductibles will be of the past, and citizens will be reassured knowing that their medical necessities will be covered. 

 

The program would be funded by combining our current, considerable sources of public funding (such as Medicare and Medicaid) with modest new taxes based on ability to pay. Over $500 billion in administrative savings would be realized by replacing today’s inefficient, profit-oriented, multiple insurance payers with a single streamlined, nonprofit, public payer.

 

The United States must also fight to ensure that big pharmaceutical companies aren’t giving the people a bad deal. By letting big pharma run wild, this country played a role in sparking the opioid crisis which disproportionately impacts lower income families. No one in America should have to break the bank just to afford life-saving medication. It is time to join every other major nation in the world in providing our people with reliable and high quality healthcare. This will involve: 

• Allowing patients, pharmacists, and wholesalers to buy low-cost prescription drugs from Canada and other industrialized countries. 

• Cut prescription drug prices in half using the Prescription Drug Price Relief Act which will peg prices to the median prices in five major countries. (Canada, the UK, France, Germany, and Japan)