OP-ED: Sen. Harper Peterson on Medicaid Expansion
I believe in North Carolina.
Even facing the enormity of COVID-19 and its devastating impact on every citizen and institution in our state, we will unite, persist, and come through this health and economic crisis together; intact and stronger.
From the disruptive loss of our school year for millions of students and teachers, the lost dreams of graduating with our classmates, lost jobs and the daily stress of how to put food on the table and medicine in the cabinet, and most painful, the cruel loss of our loved ones, I remain proud of how each one of my fellow citizens is caring not only for their families, their neighbors, but even strangers, in the face of this tragedy.
The COVID-19 pandemic has ravaged the lives and the livelihoods of all North Carolinians. 50,000 cases and over 1200 deaths across our urban and rural landscape. 1.1 million North Carolinians unemployed. Thousands of small businesses, mom and pop retail shops and restaurants, the backbone of our economy, shuttered, never to reopen. The most troubling of all are the hundreds of thousands of North Carolinians that have lost their employer-sponsored health insurance as a direct impact of the coronavirus pandemic. This does not mention all the health care providers, including nurses and clinicians, on the frontlines of this pandemic, and the essential workers, from school bus drivers delivering lunches to students to food market clerks stocking shelves, all who have been underinsured far too long, while risking their personal health for you and me.
We are all experiencing unparalleled levels of loss. These daunting times must be countered by our ability to turn this fear and uncertainty into hope and action and make the changes our state needs moving forward. We cannot deny or destroy this virus, but we can manage it and ensure that we take care of the physical and mental wellbeing of our people.
That is why I am urging my General Assembly colleagues, on both sides of the aisle, to keep our most vulnerable in their mind during this unforgiving health crisis. For me, the most immediate and effective response to reverse this pandemic is to expand Medicaid during this legislative session. With federal dollars, we can give those recently unemployed and the uninsured and underinsured access to quality and affordable health care.
In 2018, the nation spoke loudly at the voting booth; health care was their number one priority. If only Republican-led general assembly had taken heed and expanded Medicaid in 2019, more than 194,000 members of the working poor, who earn too much money to qualify for Medicaid but too little to purchase their own insurance plans, would currently have access to affordable coverage. More than half a million North Carolinians would have new access to quality and affordable health care, and would not now be choosing between putting food on the table and paying seemingly endless medical bills.
The evidence is overwhelming. Medicaid improves lives, particularly in southern states, and numerous studies confirm that expanding Medicaid would benefit every county, both health-wise and economically across North Carolina.
Expanding Medicaid, especially in rural areas will create over 37,000 new health care and community jobs in North Carolina and boost paychecks across the state. Medicaid Expansion will have an immediate impact, keeping rural hospitals open, reversing the state trend, and predictions of rural hospitals closing by 62 percent. Additionally, we will see much-needed reimbursements to struggling rural medical centers and the easing of medical debt that has been accumulating during this pandemic and economic recession.
Is Medicaid Expansion a threat to private insurance? Let me be very clear, Medicaid expansion does not mean eliminating private insurance. It simply gives those hard-working men and women who do not have private insurance, through no fault of their own, access to quality, affordable health care. Your private health insurance and employer-based insurance is safe and will only benefit from expansion. A “state takeover” of your healthcare is not in the cards, however, lower insurance premiums are, for both individual and business policies. Insurance premiums have consistently shown to be lower in states that have expanded Medicaid. There is less cost-shifting when there are fewer uninsured.
Even though the impact of COVID-19 has brought unprecedented uncertainty and sorrow to the lives of us all, I am certain of one thing. We will recover together and be whole once more.
Through our sense of community and a commitment to “As Are In This Together,” we have the power to make the much-needed changes to our state’s health services and systems that will not only ease the immediate suffering but ensure long term quality and affordable health care for all North Carolinians.