'This is health care moonshot time': Pandemic pulls Biden, Dems further left

[JoeOtterbein]

Politico

Progressives are insisting the party embrace "Medicare for All" in grim times.

By ALICE MIRANDA OLLSTEIN

07/28/2020 07:30 PM EDT

The coronavirus pandemic and the economic devastation it’s unleashed are pushing Joe Biden and the Democratic Party further to the left on health care. But it may not be far enough for some progressives.

Biden keeps inching closer to the Bernie Sanders wing of the party without embracing “Medicare for All,” by proposing to lower the eligibility age of the entitlement program from 65 to 60 and potentially extend government coverage to an additional 23 million people. He’s also backing a robust government-run public health insurance option that would auto-enroll low-income people who lose their jobs and provide another choice for Americans covered under Obamacare or at their job.

Those steps to strengthen the social safety net could tamp down the kind of infighting that roiled Democrats in the leadup to 2008 and 2016 elections. But they come as emboldened progressives insist the party embrace “Medicare for All” in its 2020 platform, saying the pandemic and tens of millions of newly unemployed Americans make a strong case for eliminating private health insurance entirely and replacing it with a single-payer system.

“The pandemic has been an ‘emperor has no clothes’ moment when it comes to insurance companies,” said Josh Orton, a Sanders delegate and member of the platform drafting committee who voted to approve the platform earlier this month. “When everyone is getting thrown off of work, it becomes obvious why having your insurance connected to your employer is bonkers."

snip

more great reporting on the most important issues of our time at link