Obamacare killed 80,000 people in 2015

Guy Benson at Townhall puts the lie to Democrat accusations that the GOP "repeal and replace" bill will kill Americans. It seems that Obamacare has already done that. Quoting Oren Cass over at National Review, it turns out that fewer people – not more people – had health insurance after Obamacare. The only increase in "coverage" was Medicaid, but, sadly, it turns out that Medicaid kills people. It's better to have no medical insurance at all.

This public-versus-private distinction is crucial, because studies of Medicaid do not find the same positive effects on mortality sometimes seen in studies of private insurance. Researchers have found that Medicaid patients with a variety of conditions and medical needs experience worse outcomes than similar uninsured patients. ... Public-health data from the Centers for Disease Control confirm... [that h]ad mortality continued to decline during ACA implementation in 2014 and 2015 at the same rate as during the 2000-13 period, 80,000 fewer Americans would have died in 2015 alone. Cass and Benson are both honest enough to point out that correlation does not prove causation. Obesity and drug abuse also correlate with the rising death rate. What can be said factually is that "[t]he best statistical estimate of the number of lives saved each year by the ACA is zero." Fearmongering for political gain is a typical Progressive tactic. Democrats are hurting real people with their scary shrieking about death by Republican. The grandstanding by GOP senators unwilling to repeal a single federal gimme from Obamacare is more of the same self-serving nonsense. Continuing Obamacare's messed up system is not good for the healthy or the sick. Eighty thousand people "helped" by Obamacare are no longer here to agree with Ronald Reagan's famous quote: "The most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the government and I'm here to help."