Health care is a human right

Karen was a special education teacher and principal at Edgerton School in Kalispell when she was diagnosed with breast cancer. Her health insurance was through her employer.

Following surgery, she worked full time through chemo and radiation treatments and was told the cancer was in remission. Within months, the cancer had spread. Too ill to work, she quit her dream job and was uninsurable. Medicaid helped with home hospice care that eased her pain through those final weeks.

She was my sister.

BCRA, the Republican health care plan, ends Montana’s Medicaid expansion, leaving tens of thousands of Montanans without coverage. It raises premiums and deductibles for thousands who purchase individual plans, and transfers responsibility to the States for deciding whether insurance will cover preexisting conditions or benefits like maternity care, mental health, or substance abuse prevention. It raises premiums for seniors, and cuts and caps medicaid for them, as well as children and people with disabilities.

In the developed world and civil society health care is a human right. Access to insurance is not the same as access to health services. Access to either without affordability is meaningless.

People will be sicker and die sooner if BCRA passes. Pray for them.

—Lynn Hamilton

Lakeside