opinion

Trump is destroying Obamacare so he can blame Obama

Why are Americans not angry about Donald Trump’s actions to dismantle the Affordable Care Act, often referred to as Obamacare, so it will fail and then he can blame them? He plans to get rid of subsidies to health insurance companies, which will cause insurance premiums to soar and insurance companies to flee from the marketplaces in each state.

These actions by Trump will raise costs for sick people, increase sales of bare-bones insurance, which will not cover essential health care for cancer patients, and add uncertainty to unstable health insurance markets.

Trump “promised more access and affordable coverage.” He is doing the opposite, and millions of Americans will lose affordable health care because of it, including many who voted for him.

We could still have affordable universal health care like all other developed countries, with better medical outcomes than the U.S., including life- and cost-saving preventative health care for early diagnosis and treatment of conditions like diabetes. The cost per person in all of the other developed counties is half as much per person, about 11 percent of GDP compared to 19 percent GDP in the U.S.

We could fix and improve Obamacare. It would have been much better when it was created if many if Republicans had not obstructed it because of their political and corporate interests.

We can reduce the overall cost of our health care system by preventing the excessive costs charged by drug and insurance companies and many hospitals and physicians.

Trump and Congress should be trying to fix Obamacare, not destroy it.

John Macatee

Iowa City