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hospitals
While Cost of Living Soars and Healthcare Taken Away, Trump Spending $1 Billion Per Day in War of Choice With Iran
"We can't afford to keep our hospitals open, but we can afford a billion dollars a day to bomb Iran?"
Mar 05, 2026
With fresh reporting that the ongoing US assault on Iran could be costing $1 billion per day in taxpayer money, opposition lawmakers, candidates for office, and outside critics are ripping the Trump administration and his allies in Congress for the financial recklessness of the unlawful and unprovoked attack on the Iranian people.
"We can't afford to keep our hospitals open, but we can afford a billion dollars a day to bomb Iran?" asked Graham Platner, a Democrat running to unseat Republican Sen. Susan Collin of Maine in this year's midterm elections, in a social media post Wednesday.
Hundreds of hospitals across the US, most of them in rural areas, are teetering on the brink of bankruptcy or closure in the wake of Trump's signing of a spending and tax giveaway bill last year that gave billions in tax breaks to corporations and the wealthy while slashing healthcare, including Medicaid.
Collins on Wednesday joined all but one member of the Republican caucus in the US Senate to vote down a War Powers Resolution that would have compelled Trump to cease military operations against Iran.
"In one fucking month we will spend more over there than we needed to save healthcare for more than 2 million Americans. They literally are taking away your food and your healthcare for this regime change war of choice." —Sen. Brian Schatz
Planter was responding to journalist Nancy Youssef of The Atlantic, who reported, citing a congressional official, that a "preliminary Pentagon cost estimate of the war in Iran is $1 billion a day."
Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) expressed similar outrage to the figure.
"This war is costing a billion dollars a day," said Schatz. "In one fucking month we will spend more over there than we needed to save healthcare for more than 2 million Americans. They literally are taking away your food and your healthcare for this regime change war of choice."
An analysis by Allison McManus at the Center for American Progress published Tuesday estimates that the US costs since bombing raids were launched by the American and Israeli forces over the weekend easily exceed $5 billion. According to McManus:
In a March 2 press conference, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine provided a glimpse into the nature of operations thus far in Operation Epic Fury. Caine described the deployment of more than 100 aircraft, the use of Tomahawk missiles, and attacks on more than 1,000 targets in just the first day of operations. Utilizing Brown University’s “Costs of War” project cost estimates of previous operations in the region—including Operation Midnight Hammer against Iran last June and engaging the Houthis in Yemen—it is likely that the operations Caine described alone would cost more than $4 billion.
But these are not the only costs. Elaine McCusker, a former Pentagon official in the first Trump administration, estimated the costs of repositioning forces in the Middle East to be around $630 million even prior to the start of hostilities. On March 2, Kuwaiti forces accidentally shot down three F-15 fighter jets in a friendly-fire incident. As these aircraft can cost as much as $117 million, this translates to an estimated total loss of $351 million. Added to the operations Caine described, a conservative estimate for the initial costs of Operation Epic Fury is more than $5 billion as of March 2—and the campaign is just getting started.
McManus further notes that the billions in military spending for a war that polls show a large majority in the US oppose, "come at a time when American citizens are acutely feeling the pressures of increased prices at home, including housing, energy, and health care costs."
As independent journalist Zaid Jilani noted, "Trump is spending a billion dollars a day killing people abroad while cutting Medicaid and health care for Americans."
"Waging a senseless and costly war raises legitimate questions about this government’s priorities," argues McManus in her analysis. "Priced at around $2.2 million, a single Tomahawk missile could cover 775 children on Medicaid for a year or provide more than 3,600 children with meals in the National School Lunch Program. At more than $5 billion and counting, the costs of Operation Epic Fury—in only its first few days of operations—could cover Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits for more than 2 million Americans for a year. If this war continues at the same pace, Americans could see their government burn through tens of billions of dollars, funds that would amount to the cost of Medicaid for millions in the United States."
John Collins, political writer based in Boston, was contemplative about the military expenditures. "Just thinking of what we could do with a billion dollars a day that doesn’t include bombing people," Collins said.
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'It Should Be Common Sense': Sanders to Headline Billionaire Tax Campaign Kickoff in California
"Our country needs access to hospitals and emergency rooms, not more tax breaks for billionaires."
Feb 10, 2026
US Sen. Bernie Sanders is headed to Los Angeles next week to lead a campaign kickoff for a bill that would impose a one-time 5% tax on the assets of California's billionaires to support the state's healthcare system, including by keeping hospitals and emergency departments open.
Economists, healthcare workers, and unions launched the fight for the tax last year, after Republicans in Congress and President Donald Trump enacted a budget package that included massive Medicaid cuts. Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West (SEIU-UHW) is spearheading the battle for the California Billionaire Tax Act.
Sanders (I-Vt.) endorsed the proposal in December, calling it "a model that should be emulated throughout the country." He is now set to appear at the Wiltern in Los Angeles alongside musical acts and other supporters of the ballot measure for the bill on Wednesday, February 18.
"At a time of unprecedented and growing wealth consolidation and income inequality, I strongly support the grassroots effort in California to impose this reasonable and necessary 5% wealth tax on about 200 California billionaires," Sanders said in a Tuesday statement.
"This initiative would provide the necessary funding to prevent over 3 million working-class Californians from losing the healthcare they currently have—and would help prevent the closures of California hospitals and emergency rooms," noted the senator, a longtime leading advocate of higher taxes for the ultrarich and Medicare for All.
"It should be common sense that the billionaires pay just slightly more so that entire communities can preserve access to lifesaving medical care," he added. "Our country needs access to hospitals and emergency rooms, not more tax breaks for billionaires."
Mayra Castaneda, an ultrasound technologist at St. Francis Medical Center in Lynwood, said that "we are very grateful for the support of US Sen. Sanders, who for years has been telling the truth about the threat that income inequality poses to our nation—and to working people."
"If we let these healthcare cuts stand, my patients will suffer," Castaneda stressed. "Hospitals and ERs will close, others will be strained by taking on more patients, and people will lose access to lifesaving care."
"This is all avoidable if billionaires just pay their fair share in California, so I'm going to do whatever is in my power to see this proposal pass in November," Castaneda continued. "I'll be telling my story alongside Sen. Sanders and urging my fellow Californians to take action to save lives."
Healthcare experts warn a crisis is here. Congress’s “Big, Beautiful Bill” cuts $100B from CA healthcare. LA Times: “People will die.” A one-time 5% billionaire tax can backfill the cuts and protect care.https://lat.ms/4amFfYK
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— SEIU-United Healthcare Workers West (@seiu-uhw.bsky.social) February 4, 2026 at 7:00 PM
According to the Los Angeles Times, which first reported on the upcoming event: "The supporters need to gather the signatures of nearly 875,000 registered voters and submit them to county elections officials by June 24 for the measure to qualify for the November ballot. They began gathering signatures in January."
While the bill targeting the state's billionaires is backed by Sanders—who caucuses with Democrats in Congress and twice sought the party's presidential nomination—its opponents include Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who is expected to run for president in 2028.
"Gavin Newsom is on the side of the billionaires, not the millions of working people who stand to lose healthcare because of the Trump cuts," progressive organizer Jonathan Rosenblum said after the governor made his position clear last month. "Shamefully typical of the Democratic establishment."
The Times noted Tuesday that other opponents include "San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan, who is among a dozen candidates running in November to replace the termed-out governor."
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We Need to Get the Private Healthcare Incentives Out of Our Hospital Bathrooms
An attempt to procure toilet paper and face tissues during a hospital stay illustrates everything that's wrong with the US healthcare system.
Dec 20, 2025
Have you ever seen quality toilet paper in a hospital restroom? Seriously. Most of the time, we are all just damned lucky if we have a clean bathroom in the patient’s room, and we all know the situation with most hospitals’ public restrooms (yuck).
Decent toilet paper seems to be a small request to make of your hospital given that the status of our bodily functions (digestive issues or issues causing digestive issues) is often the reason for hospitalization. And sometimes we must get well enough to have our digestive systems functioning to be released. The health industry earns massive profits—so much more in daily charges than any hotel room you or I have ever imagined staying in—and yet the decisions made about our most basic comforts related to personal hygiene don’t reflect those profits at all.
With Congress deciding to dump the Affordable Care Act subsidies, hospitals will have to tighten their belts even more to retain their precious profits, so I doubt we will be getting Charmin and Puffs any time soon.
Well, most hospitals secure their cheap, one-ply toilet paper under lock and key. I couldn’t believe it, though you’d think I would by now. Like they are guarding gold at Fort Knox, the hospital corporations protect their toilet paper and paper towel assets more than they protect patients by locking up the worst and cheapest paper products they could secure. Having extra replacement rolls anywhere seems really a stretch for these facilities too. And if the staff who hold the keys are not at work or if the hospital is short-staffed like many are these days, getting paper products may be on you. It sure was for us, and HCA Healthcare is true to that trend of cutting corners on one of the items that “touches” patients and their families.
Not having toilet paper to wipe a sore bottom or tissue to blow your nose is one thing. We wonder who buys the supplies for the operating room?
I begged people to find us toilet paper and paper towels—nurses when I could find one, techs when they had one, housekeeping on the days there was one, and even tried teasing that I’d bring it from home. The first day we got by, but by the fifth day we were weary of the begging and saying, “Pretty please” to anyone who looked like they might give a damn. No one did until one young man cleaning an empty room figured out that if I was asking for his bucket and mop, I might need help somewhere. He was getting that empty room ready to fill again with more revenue—a new patient—no time for him to attend to patients already in a room languishing without needed services and no toilet paper.
I sent messages through the patient portal because no one answered any admin lines for patients and families. Surprise, surprise, surprise.
MyHealthONE Help Desk
Please get my husband paper towels & TP in his bathroom and clean the room
You
(Sent) 8/9/2025
at 5:02 pm
We know it's a weekend, and we are very sorry its hard to staff the hospital appropriately for that, but I'd like my husband to have paper towel and toilet paper in his bathroom so I do not have to provide paper products to him from outside PSLs in Denver. I need a mop and cleaning supplies to clean his room as well. I'll do it because yesterday, Friday, only one tech had to cover the floor, one cleaning person stuck her head in and said it looked good, and today it is gross. Just gross. My husband has tried to clean his own bathroom several times. If he is hurt doing that, I fear the problems that will create for him. Please help us. Please.
I hope you will follow here that if they will do this with basic supplies and services, my friends, what do you think they do with all the other purchases they make to run the hospital?
I’m sharing my DoorDash receipt copy below as a cautionary tale:
Door Dash Order Complete
Saturday, August 9, 2025 at 5:42 pm
Enjoy!
Your Dasher: [Redacted]
Total $19.79;
Retail Delivery Fees $0.29
Delivery Fee $2.99
Service Fee $3.00, $.99
Estimated Tax $1.66
Dasher Tip $5.00
Total $27.73
Payment
[Redacted] · 8/9/2025 · 5:26 pm
$27.73
Address
1719 E 19th Ave
Denver, CO 80218
Instructions: I will meet you at the curb of the Main entrance, main lobby of PresStLukes Hospital. You need to hand this order directly to me.
I sat in the lobby of a health industry behemoth that made more than $600 million in clear profit last year and received my delivery order. Exhausted from being the unpaid staff of the hospital—Presbyterian St. Lukes in Denver, an HCA Healthcare facility—at least I had tissue to wipe my nose that didn’t leave me raw and bleeding like their protected paper did. I cried a lot, and no one had a tissue. Patients are not given facial tissue anymore nor are they given other personal hygiene items. It must be an expense they just couldn’t justify.
None of this ought to make you feel safe. Not having toilet paper to wipe a sore bottom or tissue to blow your nose is one thing. We wonder who buys the supplies for the operating room? The neonatal intensive care unit? Do they cut those same corners with everything? What do you think?
The only way out of this mess is to finally pass universal single payer, improved and expanded Medicare for All and get the profit incentives out of our hospital bathrooms. Please.
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