People's Action Endorses Medicare for All Act; Will Rally Support for Bill

People's Action has endorsed the Medicare for All Act of 2019, a bill to establish a national, universal single-payer health program. Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) officially announced the proposed legislation in a letter to her colleagues on Wednesday.

Jayapal, the founding director of OneAmerica, a People's Action member organization, is the bill's lead sponsor.

In coming weeks and months, People's Action and its member organizations will lead mass organizing efforts in key geographies to advance the Medicare for All Act of 2019, including:

• In-district actions and town hall meetings on Improved Medicare for All;
• Driving calls from constituents to their representatives urging co-sponsorship of the bill;
• Meeting with members of congress in-district and in Washington, D.C.

People's Action and its member organizations previously led successful field campaigns to save Medicare, Medicaid, and SNAP, as well as pass and vigorously defend the Affordable Care Act. In May 2018, People's Action member organizations formally voted to endorse Improved Medicare for All as the network's official stance on health care justice at the federal level.

"This bill lays out a clear plan to ensure all of us can get the quality health care we need, regardless of how much money we have in our bank account. It moves us closer to realizing health as a human right, which is what our members have clearly and boldly demanded since People's Action and its member organizations started organizing for health care justice decades ago," said Connie Huynh, director of the Health Care for All campaign at People's Action.

People's Action has been working with a coalition of allied progressive organizations to refine and strategize around the legislation for months, and is confident this bill will make much-needed structural changes to America's health care system:

• Replace the inadequate patchwork of private insurance, out-of-pocket payment, and public programs which currently subsidize health care with an expanded and improved Medicare program;
• Provide medical, dental, vision, prescription drugs, reproductive health services, and long term care at no cost to patients;
• Drastically reduce health care costs by eliminating the administrative overhead of private insurance and by allowing the government to negotiate lower prescription drug prices.