HELP PROTECT AFFORDABLE HEALTH CARE

June 23, 2017

From the Washington State Catholic Conference:

On Thursday, June 22, U.S. Senate leadership unveiled its health care bill that would repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare). Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell plans to bring the bill to a vote before the 4th of July recess, which could begin at the end of the day on June 30. In the bill’s amendment process, your U.S. Senators have the ability to significantly alter the bill from its present form before it is brought to a vote. Contacting your Senators in the next few days could make a serious impact on the final text of the bill.

While there are some positive aspects of the Senate bill, other provisions would cause millions of Americans to lose access to affordable health care. In a June 22 USCCB statement, Bishop Frank J. Dewane of Venice, Florida, declared, “… this proposal retains many of the fundamental defects of the House of Representatives-passed health care legislation, and even further compounds them. It is precisely the detrimental impact on the poor and vulnerable that makes the Senate draft unacceptable as written.” The USCCB specifies that any health care reform must provide:

Access to truly affordable health care for all;
Removal of harmful changes to Medicaid that will wreak havoc on the poor and vulnerable;
Access to coverage for immigrants and their families;
Protections for the unborn;
Conscience protections for those involved in the health care system.

To tell your U.S. Senators there should be significant changes to the Senate health care bill, entitled the Better Care Reconciliation Act of 2017, click here.

For more details on the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ (USCCB) engagement on this issue, please see the statement released Thursday, June 22, on the USCCB website.