How do I research presidential candidate views on healthcare? What if I google each candidate’s web site?
Donald Trump has a Positions page on reforming the VA Medical System. Much hyperbole, but he does say: Under a Trump Administration, all veterans eligible for VA health care can bring their veteran’s ID card to any doctor or care facility that accepts Medicare to get the care they need immediately.
Bernie Sanders has an issue pages for Fighting to Lower Prescription Drug Prices (allow Medicare to negotiate with drug companies, allow Americans to buy from Canada, require price and cost transparency, prohibit deals that keep generic drugs off the market, plus more). Elsewhere he has advocated for universal national health insurance. Bernie has the most substance.
Jeb Bush has a Policies page leading to a health care plan. He would repeal ObamaCare by promoting innovation including promoting private sector leadership of health information technology (WTF) and lower cost by providing tax credits and increase limits on Health Savings accounts. Bush’s site is the only one I saw available in multiple languages.
Hillary Clinton also has an issues page with Health as a Human Right. She defends the Affordable Care Act, wants to reduce cost of prescription drugs, expand rural health, and defend reproductive rights.
Marco Rubio‘s Health Care issues page wants full repeal of ObamaCare by providing an advanceable, refundable tax credit, promote Medicaid innovation with block grants to states, and promoting market competition for Medicare.
OK, I had to stop. Fairly boring and dense. Dense like a fog. I don’t like that combination.
Actually, the only time I ever heard a candidate speak about #caregivers was when Donald Berwick was running for governor of Massachusetts. He said that our healthcare system would collapse without family caregivers. We should support them.
What about social media? How will I see the chatter about the candidates and healthcare. How would I check that? I went to Symplur to find out what the common hash tags were. Almost 9,000 health care related hash tags. Trying to search Symplur for candidates and healthcare politics hash tags. Nothing really. Tried #singlepayer – that got me somewhere. Searching under healthcare hash tags by candidate leads to nothing.
I don’t quite know what to make of this fog. Health care is a universal concern – more universal than gun rights and Syrian refugees. No national conversation(s)? Doesn’t make sense to me. What do you think? Where do these conversations occur? Where should they occur? Where do they occur for you?
Thanks for this Danny–a good overview. Whenever I talk to Jer and family about Canadian single payer health care–it sounds so simple, refreshingly transparent, and superior to just about everything in our system. They complain about needing to wait to see specialists, but living here in a rural area–plenty of times we need to wait, or travel too far to get the kind of care we need/want.