Six Days Out, a Look at the Six Biggest Health Care Lies Trump Told Virginians

From the Democratic Party of Virginia:

Six Days Out, a Look at the Six Biggest Health Care Lies Trump Told Virginians

RICHMOND – With six days to go until Election Day, the Democratic Party of Virginia is highlighting six of the biggest lies President Trump has made about his health care record. Despite repeated promises and claims that he has a plan for a “great health care program”, Trump has consistently tried to tear down the Affordable Care Act through legislative and judicial means, the latest attempt in a case the Supreme Court will hear a week after the election.

“After four years in Office, President Trump still isn’t listening to the experts, and he still doesn’t have a plan to strengthen health care for Virginians,” said Hannah Muldavin, Press Secretary for the Democratic Party of Virginia. “Indeed, while Joe Biden wants to expand health coverage and make it cheaper, Trump is pushing to take away health care from Virginians during a pandemic that has already resulted in the deaths of 226,000 Americans and 3,600 Virginians. That’s why Virginians are going to elect Joe Biden: to make sure we have a proven leader we can trust with their health care.”

Six Biggest Health Care Lies Trump Has Told Virginians

1. In 2015, Trump promised Virginians that “We’re going to have that great health care program. But we’re going to take care of everyone, we’re going to take care of people. And people are going to pay much less and get it so good.” [Trump Campaign Rally, Richmond VA, 10/14/15]

• Trump’s budgets have proposed cutting billions of dollars from Social Security programs, and hundreds of billions from Medicare and Medicaid. More than 1.2 million Virginians rely on their hard-earned Medicare benefits, and one out of every four Virginia children are covered through Medicaid.

2. Trump said the virus would “disappear” at least34 times.

• Despite six months going by since the first reported case in America, the virus is not under control — Virginia Department of Health said that COVID-19 cases are continuing to spike in Virginia, and the U.S. reported a record of more than 500,000 new cases in this past week alone.
• We have lost over 226,000 Americans and 3,600 Virginians to the COVID-19 virus.
• As many as 482,000 Virginians were unemployed at the peak of the COVID recession, and unemployment had more than tripled since the start of the year. Trump’s COVID economy has become the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression.

3. Trump says he willalwaysprotect people with pre-existing conditions.

• Not only does Trump have absolutely no plan to protect people with pre-existing conditions, he is actively trying to take away protections.
• The week after the election, the Trump administration will go before the Supreme Court in a case to have the Affordable Care Act struck down.
• If Trump is successful, 642,000 Virginians could lose their health coverage, nearly doubling the state’s number of uninsured residents. Without the ACA’s protections, as many as 3.5 million Virginians with preexisting conditions could have been denied coverage or charged higher rates.

4. Trump hasrepeatedlylied about lowering the costs of prescription drug prices.

• Trump falsely claimed to have made insulin prices “as cheap as water” for Americans, and promised that he would make health care costs “lower” for people.
• Drug prices have continued to increase during his Presidency, despite his claims that they have gone down.

5. Trumpsaidhe was “taking care of seniors”.

• If the Trump-GOP lawsuit is successful, 110,000 Virginia seniors are at risk of having to pay more for prescription drugs because the Medicare “donut hole” will be reopened.
• From 2010 to 2016 more than 11.8 million Medicare beneficiaries have received discounts over $26.8 billion on prescription drugs – an average of $2,272 per beneficiary.
• In Virginia, 109,517 seniors each saved an average of $1,104 because of the ACA.

6. Trump hasclaimedvictory over the opioid crisis, saying he’s reduced addiction and deaths from opioids.

• Despite promises made by Trump to address the opioid crisis during his campaign, preliminary data shows that overdose deaths rose 4.6% in the United States in 2019.
• By tearing down the ACA and its allowance for states to expand Medicaid, Trump is putting many who got access to treatment services at risk of losing coverage. Coverage through Medicaid is the primary way many who have substance use disorders are able to afford and access treatment, with studies showing that expanding Medicaid led to a 6% reduction in opioid overdose deaths.
• Across the country, more than 1.8 million people got treatment for mental health and substance use disorders because of Medicaid expansion, and studies show that Medicaid expansion increases access to treatments for opioid addiction.