Voters Support Empowering Medicare To Cover Americans Health Care Costs During The Crisis

By Ethan Winter

Millions of Americans are suddenly out of work. Now laid off, the vast majority will lose their employer-sponsored insurance––if they were lucky enough to have it in the first place. In short, this crisis has revealed the hollowness of that refrain that if one likes their insurance, they can keep it. 

The precise origins of this economic crisis––a global pandemic––makes the sudden influx of uninsured families an increasingly urgent catastrophe in the making. Forced out of work because of an unprecedented health emergency, they are then deprived of their means by which they can obtain care for themselves and their loved ones. 

One means of ameliorating this would be for Congress and the President to pass a proposal from Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Pramila Jayapal, the Health Care Emergency Guarantee Act. The proposal calls for empowering Medicare to cover the costs of all treatment for the uninsured and cover all out-of-pocket costs for those with public or private insurance, for as long as this pandemic continues. This would include the cost of any and all coronavirus testing and an eventual vaccine. This is a common-sense measure that will use policy infrastructure already in place to make sure everyone in America can receive the care they need at no cost to themselves. 

As part of an April survey, Data for Progress sought to test support for this proposal. We asked voters, specifically: 

Some lawmakers in Congress are proposing that Medicare will ensure that everyone in America, regardless of existing coverage, can receive the health care they need during this crisis. This includes coverage for all health care treatment for free, including coronavirus testing, treatment, and the eventual vaccine. Do you support or oppose this proposal?

We found overwhelming, bipartisan support for the proposal. Among all voters, the proposal enjoys a massive 63-percentage-point margin of support (76 percent support, 13 percent oppose). Democrats back it by a wide 83-percentage-point margin of support (88 percent support, 5 percent oppose) and Republicans do so by a 45-percentage-point margin (69 percent support, 24 percent oppose). 

 
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Voters support, by truly massive margins, the emergency use of Medicare to cover all costs for the uninsured and the out-of-pocket costs of those with insurance, for the duration of the coronavirus crisis. It’s time for lawmakers in Washington to listen. 


Ethan Winter is an analyst at Data for Progress.