Issue Position: MEDICAID EXPANSION

Issue Position

Expanding the accessibility of healthcare,
and securing hospital availability
for all of Kansas.
Across the nation, the COVID-19 pandemic has disproportionately impacted the health and economic viability of the Black community -- a constituency that already lacks critical access to affordable healthcare services. As the nation calls for systemic change, to address the existing racial disparities in our society, it is clear that Medicaid expansion must come at the top of the list.

But Medicaid expansion will aid a much wider range of Kansans, as well -- including the poorer members of extended families, helping to relieve their middle-class family members of the burden of assisting in their less-fortunate relatives' health care, or dealing with their potential resulting disability.

It will also be the strongest measure for stopping the current accelerating collapse of Kansas' rural hospitals, which urgently need Medicaid help to care for EVERYone, if they are to stay solvent enough to remain open, to care for ANYone.

As the pressures of COVID-19 open our eyes to the importance of healthcare access for all Kansans -- to prevent the spread of the pandemic to everyone -- I am very hopeful that my colleagues, with my urging and support, will finally put partisan differences aside, during the 2021 session of the Kansas legislature, to finally pass a Medicaid expansion bill that will benefit struggling Kansans, and our whole state at large.

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