• centof@lemm.ee
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    1 day ago

    How conveniently timed, right after Trump’s EO to supposedly reduce medicine costs. Definitely no distractions or collusion there.

    • Initiateofthevoid@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      1 day ago

      Whaaat, the EO that the stable genius claimed will save “TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS”?

      “It really does seem the plan is to ask manufacturers to voluntarily lower their prices to some point, which is not known,” Sachs said. “If they do not lower their prices to the desired point, HHS shall take other actions with a very long timeline, some of which could potentially, years in the future, lower drug prices"

      That executive order?

      You think he would write a toothless, narrowly-focused, bullshit executive order as, what?

      A distraction?

      From the massive cut to medicaid? That he and his entire party promised a thousand times over they would never do? That will absolutely, directly, fuck over not just Americans on medicaid - but all Americans? Everywhere?

      If you didn’t know, the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) is far more than just an insurance provider! It’s a critical part of our healthcare system.

      As most nursing homes rely almost exclusively on CMS funding, they also have to obey CMS rules if they want to get paid. Rules which - in a lot of states - are basically the only thing keeping grandma alive!

      The piss-poor quality of elder care in this country can and will plummet even further if CMS was ever reduced in scope and funding. That would be horrifying and evil.

      Can you imagine, a sitting president willfully dismantling a load-bearing pillar of our society like that? And lying about it? In writing?

      Were you aware that much of our problems in US healthcare - in one way or another - tie back to CMS not being allowed to negotiate drug prices at all? At least until recently in 2022, when democrats pushed a bill that at least allowed some drug prices to be negotiated?

      Which is why an executive order would ever be necessary - because CMS, the single largest American insurance provider, is legally not allowed to negotiate most of its drug prices, and instead just has to take what it gets?

      And you think a sitting President would do that? Write a bullshit executive order as a distraction? Set up a faux protest from major pharmaceutical companies, who have a vested interest in privatizing as much of the healthcare industry as possible?

      Pharmaceutical companies who will loudly complain about the executive order on maybe-potentially-in-the-future reduced drug prices, but for some reason keep funneling money into the Republican warchest?

      All while he further hamstrings the literal life support system for senior citizens in America? Claim he’s saving us trillions of dollars, while quietly pulling the plug on our most vulnerable neighbors?

      You think he would pretend it’s for our sake, even though the downstream effects of forcing people off health insurance inevitably leads to abandonment of all routine, preventative care? An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, you know!

      All those poor patients will then get debilitating mountains of illness where there should have been easily treatable mole hlls, the total cost to the healthcare system will skyrocket, local family health and preventative care services will suffer and bankrupt due to a sudden lack of insured customers, and chronically underfunded hospital systems in low income areas will collapse as they increasingly pay the costs of keeping their community alive!

      And you think a sitting president would do that? Throw out a bullshit distraction while he pulls the trigger on a decades-long effort to collapse all public funding for healthcare? Send our rural and urban healthcare systems into a tailspin? Open up the floor for private equity to finish cannibalizing whatever’s left, all for higher stock prices and earning reports?

      Surely that could never happen in a civilized society.