Moran should continue bucking GOP health care philosophy

On July 6, Sen. Jerry Moran temporarily embraced boldness after a town hall meeting in Palco. Our junior senator met hundreds of constituents to discuss the health care experiences of real people from across the state. Rural and urban hospital administrators came to argue for Medicaid funding, and he got an earful from a western Kansas doctor who once provided care to the senator’s children.

Our senator said he was not going to vote for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s “Better Health Care Reform Act” (BCRA) because it failed to serve the interests of Moran’s constituents. This epiphany seemed to reflect a sympathetic understanding of the many issues inherent in the health care debate in Kansas.

Not long ago in Kansas, a life cut short by mishap or illness was commonplace. Such events were mostly “bad luck” or fate, and so the burden was individual and familial. The community was mostly there for the mourning.

Then things changed. Medical research, healthcare and government policies produced unimaginable change since the mid-20th Century. Unexpected death became rarer and chronic illness managed with diet, good medical care and medications became the norm. Good health care began to seem less a random privilege and more a right.

Medicare commenced in 1965. It is now universally available for Americans at age 65. Today, 435,000 Kansans are age eligible for Medicare. Medicaid assists many elderly – both rural and urban – who can’t afford nursing care on their own. Today, 43,000 Kansas seniors receive such assistance. In all, 425,000 Kansans were enrolled in Medicaid and SCHIP at the end of 2016. There are 204,000 Kansas veterans of which 16 percent are rated for disability and receive some VA health benefits. Nearly 100,000 Kansans were enrolled in ACA health insurance coverage at the end of the 2017 enrollment period last winter.

When Moran and Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) announced they would not vote for BCRA, McConnell proposed a full repeal of the Affordable Care Act with a commitment to make the repeal effective after the 2018 election so that a replacement capable of attracting a perhaps bipartisan majority might be constructed. This is a “hamburger today for which I shall pay you Tuesday” approach for the gullible. If repeal occurs first, the matter will become the battle cry of the 2018 congressional elections, and after that a deflated and scuffed football to be kicked all the way to the end of the 2020 presidential election season and beyond.

Now is the time for Senator Moran to stop auditioning for the role of Wimpy in the “hamburger today” show and instead embrace the role of leadership and advocacy for the million and more constituents in Kansas who know that these health policy issues need to be fixed now — not repealed with a feeble commitment to “replace” later.

This story was originally published July 23, 2017 at 5:42 AM with the headline "Moran should continue bucking GOP health care philosophy."