Credit: Erich Martin/Levittownnow.com
Whether you are healthy or sick, young or old, Medicaid cuts would have an impact on just about everyone, according to advocates.
The topic of discussion, the importance of Medicaid and the services and benefits it provides, brought a number of advocates, recipients, experts, and local officials out for the discussion at Monday evening’s general membership meeting for the Bucks County chapter of the NAACP.
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“Medicaid is not just for the elderly, extremely ill or pregnant women,” said Mikhel Harrison, an organizer from Organizing for Action and Indivisible.
Medicaid helps pay for nursing home care for the elderly, for special education students in public schools and more. Roughly 26 percent of taxes paid goes towards Medicare and Medicaid, with the latter taking more of the funds and helping more people.
In addition to educating attendees on the importance of supporting medicaid, organizers urged attendees to get in touch with their congressmen, and local newspapers by penning letters to the editor.
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“This is not a spectator event, you cannot sit back and watch these cuts take place,” Harrison said.
The organizers noted that the recent tax bill has been predicted to increase the national deficit by more than a trillion dollars, a fact backed by a report by the Congressional Budget Office. A worry is that cuts to Medicaid and other social safety net programs could see cuts to help balance the budget.
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The available solutions to the budget problem aren’t ideal, presenters explained. Closing the gap would require tax increases, cuts to programs like Medicaid and other entitlements or making changes to the Medicaid system to make it more efficient from the start.
“We knew that this was coming,” started Karen Downer, the president of the Bucks County chapter of the NAACP. “We also knew that the shortage of money was going to have to come from some place, and Medicaid always seems like the first target.”
“When you cut medicaid for students with disabilities, you hurt every other kid in that school system,” said Rachel Fingles, an attorney and member of the Bensalem School Board.
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By making sure every child receives an adequate education, resources that would normally come from the government to support students with disabilities would come from the district. The amount of money for the rest of the students would dwindle, Fingles said.
“This is a real issue, these are real people,” said Anna Payne, a Medicaid recipient and activist. Payne lives with cystic fibrosis and is a resident of Middletown and was elected Middletown Township Auditor in 2017.
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“To these people in Washington, we might just be numbers on a spreadsheet, but this is my life.”
