Portsmouth, NH – After taking a stand to oppose last week’s shutdown deal over Speaker Johnson’s unwillingness to ensure a vote in Congress to extend health care tax credits, Stefany Shaheen proposed action she’d take as a member of Congress to reduce the costs of health care for Granite Staters on WMUR TV. Shaheen, a long-time health care advocate, is running for Congress in New Hampshire’s first district to take on the big corporations that are putting exorbitant profits before people.
“Extending the ACA credits is the very tip of the iceberg, we have fundamental problems to fix to make health care actually work for people. Here are three things I would propose immediately to reduce health care costs for kids, families, veterans, senior citizens, everyone,” said Stefany Shaheen. “Health care has been the cause of my life ever since my daughter Elle’s diagnosis with type 1 diabetes. I’ve had to fight tooth and nail with insurance companies to get her the care and medication she needs. I know how hard it is. I am turning anger into action and ready to fight to get every family in New Hampshire health care that actually works at a cost they can actually afford.”
Shaheen’s plan:
- Break up the Wall Street monopolies taking over the entire health care system. Big Wall Street banks and investment firms, insurance companies are buying up hospitals, doctor’s offices, pharmacies. They’re taking a cut at every stop, raising costs for everyone.
- Stop big pharma from ripping us off by charging Americans more than people in other countries. Granite Staters are paying two, three or even four times more for medicine than people in Canada, the United Kingdom or Japan. That’s got to stop.
- Stop AI from coming between people and their doctor. The Trump Administration is getting ready to launch a program to see how AI could deny coverage and care to people on Medicare – which would impact more than 350,000 Granite Staters. Doctors and nurses should be making decisions about health care, not computer algorithms.
Shaheen immediately made clear her opposition to a deal that ended the government shutdown but failed to protect ACA tax credits. She joined MSNBC, CNN, and NPR to discuss the health care fight ahead and her opposition to the shutdown deal. In an interview this weekend with WMUR, she outlined her proposals. A transcript of that interview with WMUR is copied below and the full interview can be watched here.
TRANSCRIPT:
“The tax credit extensions are just the very tip of the iceberg. We know that the Affordable Care Act means lots of improvement. We know the health care system is broken. There are three things I would propose immediately to try to address some of the most damaging parts of our broken system.
The first is we had to break up the Wall Street monopolies that currently control the entire health care system. You’re seeing insurance companies buy up pharmaceutical companies, buy up hospitals, and buy other health insurance companies. We got to break up those monopolies. This is really impacting New Hampshire, think about the impact of rural health care, rural hospitals that have been bought by multinational corporations that have no connection to our communities here.
“The second thing I would propose immediately is and I would sign on as a member of Congress to the bipartisan legislation that’s trying to bring down drug prices. The idea that in the United States of America, we’re paying sometimes four times the amount of money for the same prescription that our neighbors in Canada can get access to, that’s unacceptable. We got to change that.
“And finally, I would ensure, again, in the very near term, that we prevent AI from ever making a decision about who gets coverage and who doesn’t. The Trump administration is currently saying that they’re going to use AI to try to determine whether people will be able to get certain benefits through Medicare. That’s 25% of New Hampshire citizens who are relying on Medicare. We’re going to allow AI to decide whether those folks should be able to take access to care. Again, here we go with a system that’s allowing insurance companies and technology to dictate care instead of the doctors.
“And I’ll just say, because I’ve been in this place with a child who I’ve had to fight tooth and nail to get the services she needs, to get the medication she needs, I know how hard it is, and we have to make sure families aren’t faced with those kinds of choices.”
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