What They Are Saying: Let’s Build On and Strengthen our Current Health Care System 

WASHINGTON – Access to affordable, high-quality health coverage and care continues to be a priority for Americans. And, building on what’s working in health care continues to be the most effective way to ensure Americans have access to the health care coverage they deserve.  

Increased subsidies have helped a record number of Americans gain access to coverage when they needed it most. These subsidies also made health care coverage more affordable for Americans, and the average monthly premium for Americans fell by 23 percent. 3.2 million Americans were also able to select a plan for $10 or less per month. With these successes, we should continue to build on what’s working in health care, reduce health care costs for American families, and expand access to affordable, high-quality coverage instead of starting over by creating unaffordable, new government health insurance systems like Medicare for All or the public option. 

Health care experts and reports say that building on what’s working in health care continues to be the priority:  

The rate of Americans without health care coverage dropped to a near historic low  

•  “If there has been a silver lining to this terrible Covid-19 pandemic, it is that the rate of Americans without health insurance dropped to a near historic low, thanks to various federal initiatives connected to the government-declared public health emergency.” (New York Times, 04/04/22) 
• ”Before the pandemic, states would regularly review people’s eligibility for Medicaid benefits and remove people who no longer qualified. But with that practice suspended, Medicaid enrollment has grown by 12 percent since the beginning of the pandemic; as many as one in four Americans are now insured by the program.” (New York Times, 04/04/22) 
• “Overall, there were 14.5 million people who signed up for coverage for 2022 when considering both the state-run exchanges and the federally run HealthCare.gov, a record number.” (Fierce Healthcare, 04/04/22) 

Costs for individuals remained low 

• “Customers signing up on state-run exchanges saw average premium savings of 7% to 47% for 2022, according to a report from the National Association for State Health Policy. The report added that at least eight exchanges had 20% or more of their customers paying less than $25 a month for coverage.” (Fierce Healthcare, 04/04/22) 
• The latest polling shows that voters also prefer building on what’s working in our current health care system. The latest edition of Voter Vitals – a nationwide health care tracking survey conducted by Locust Street Group – shows that 57 percent of voters prefer to build on what’s working by providing subsidies for those in states that did not expand Medicaid to purchase coverage in the existing marketplace. 

Building on and improving what’s working in health care is the future of health care reform and lawmakers should continue to focus on building on our current system, not starting over by creating unaffordable, new government-controlled health insurance systems. 

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