By Sebastian Lopez
Two weeks ago in Texas, 38-year-old second grade teacher Heather Holland became the center of an ongoing discussion regarding healthcare costs after she died of the flu. According to Holland’s husband, the teacher died due to the out-of-pocket price of the antiviral medicine prescribed by her doctor being too costly. This is a familiar and seemingly unique American story of death by way of treatment price that has energized a movement from the left toward a more just healthcare system in the United States.
Nationwide, a serious discussion around healthcare has risen around the idea of a single-payer system, which various prominent leftist political organizations as well as Democrats are making a big push for this year. The idea revolves around the idea of guaranteed healthcare for everybody in the United States, paid by their government, that leaves no one, especially those who could not otherwise afford treatment, behind. Such a policy would work under the assumption that health and life are human rights, like protection against fires.
This rise in this discussion could be attributed to independent Senator Bernard “Bernie” Sanders, who was famous for pointing out during his 2016 presidential campaign that “shamefully, the United States remains the only major country on Earth that does not guarantee healthcare to all people,” and calling for a federal single-payer healthcare system.
Last year, Senator Sanders introduced the Medicare-for-All Act of 2017, which was co-sponsored by 15 Senate Democrats. The bill seeks to expand Medicare, which currently benefits those over the age of 65 as well as people who are disabled, to every individual resident of the country. This move followed in the footsteps of Democratic Congressman John Conyers, who has been introducing such legislation since 2003.
Our current president also made waves in 2016 during his own campaign when he advocated for a healthcare system that would “take care of everybody. I don’t care if it costs me votes or not. Everybody’s going to be taken care of much better than they’re taken care of now.” This language did not survive the Republican president’s election.
Washington, a state stricken by various crises such as lack of housing, opioid addiction, and poverty, has been empowered to be at the forefront of the fight for a statewide single-payer healthcare system for almost 20 years. Though the state benefits from a bipartisan direction in terms of healthcare, it is still stricken by a neoliberal-based structure that cannot cover everybody within its borders, embraces health insurance and pharmaceutical companies, and only covers the most basic of basics in healthcare needs.
The organization Health Care for All Washington (HCFA-WA) could be ascribed as the first of many movement in the last 20 years. The organization has pushed many state legislative bills since 2000, including the 2017-2018 session HB 1026 and SB 5701. These bills, which are derivatives of bills introduced in the past 18 years, both call for a statewide ‘health trust’ to use for state residents’ healthcare needs.
HCFA-WA’s 18 years of activity have inspired those at Whole Washington, another single-payer healthcare organization in Washington seeking a healthcare program that covers everybody.
Last month, Whole Washington introduced voter initiative I-1600, which was approved for the November ballot by the Secretary of State and is now seeking the signatures needed to actually make it onto the ballot. I-1600, inspired by the work of HCFA-WA’s many legislative aspirations, seeks to create the Whole Washington Health Trust; which would create a single-payer system accessible to all residents of Washington, as well as non-resident students.
“I see people dying because they can’t get enough donations on their GoFundMe page. I see patients leave rehab knowing they won’t have the home health or outpatient coverage they need to continue to recover. I see elderly disabled individuals paying 25% of their income on healthcare expenses,” Erin Georgen, the initiative’s writing committee chair, tells the CPJ.
“On top of that, providers are burning out on paperwork and insurance hurdles, while facing proposed funding cuts to healthcare programs they and their patients depend on. Our state needs to reduce wasteful administrative costs and ensure consistent funding sources for our state’s residence healthcare and the providers who serve them.”
The Whole Washington Health Trust would be a non-profit entity that would be used to provide care for everybody in the state, negotiate drug prices, which would include negotiating bulk drug purchases with the state’s tribes, cover vision and dental, cover everybody under the age of 19, and work with out-of-state providers to care for Washington state residents .
The Trust would also create new taxes in order to be funded including a 1% income tax for those earning $15,000 and above which would be called a ‘personal health assessment’ and would only be allowed to be used for state healthcare. It would also be funded by a payroll tax of 8.5%, which could be exempt of the first $60,000, a capital gains tax of 8.5% that would not include retirement income, and home sales and farm income taxes.
“The middle class and businesses are projected to save the most, but the benefits package exceeds all currently available to residents through any public program,” Georgen continued, “providers also have a lot to gain by having one primary insurance coverage and one baseline level of benefits residents are covered for, it will reduce the amount of time providers spend getting preauthorizations and negotiating with insurers for the more than 130 plans residents are enrolled in (or not enrolled in) currently.”
In order to gather the necessary votes, Whole Washington is asking for donations to put into their ‘petition posse’. Last year, the organization gathered $25,000 and spent $10,000 on a study which prompted a change in language from a campaign supporting legislation into one revolving around a voter initiative, hence I-1600.
This move has some questioning the validity behind Whole Washington’s movement. Though these critics are the same individuals who would like to see a single-payer healthcare system that covers everybody, they question how Whole Washington sees the state of Washington paying for a program that could cost up to 50 billion dollars. The state already suffers from being the most regressive state in the country due to the legal challenge of imposing an income tax.
Andrew Saturn, a leftist activist and affiliate of WOKE Washington, a progressive organizing group that worked closely with Whole Washington during its outset, calls the initiative “yet another incrementalist proposal from yet another for-profit do-nothing ‘message campaign.’ These campaigns, which all seem to employ the same group of individuals, view the performance of attempting to change our existing capitalist institutions — and intentionally failing to disrupt the status quo — as some measure of success.”
Single-payer healthcare as a concept has been on the minds of political economy thinkers since the 19th century. Today, the issue is seen as an important facet in the discussions around social, economic, and environmental justice. Washington itself is one of many states today with movements that are fighting for statewide programs that would provide care for every individual within its borders, though statewide sustainability of such a program seems dubious to most.
Organizations such as the Democratic Socialists of America, as well as federal representatives like Senator Bernie Sanders, are focusing their their energy on pushing a nationwide program that works by deriving itself from an existing program which exhibits a successful structure, ample popularity, and language that could be built upon, such as Medicare.
“[If passed] Washington state could lead the nation in guaranteeing healthcare and help to provide data and an example of how universal healthcare can work effectively in the US. Many of the major achievements our country has made in the past, started with state and local achievement,” Georgen said of the implications of the initiative succeeding. “We are a Democratic Republic of States, state level progress often has impact on national discourse and our efforts are a part of a much larger movement too.”
Whether or not a statewide program is sustainable, one thing is true: the authorization of such a program by state voters would send the strong message that, yes, healthcare is a human right.
Whole Washington is a grassroots organization intent on creating a statewide universal healthcare program in Washington. To learn more, visit their website at www.wholewashington.com.
