‘My life depends on it.’ Health care reemerges as a top issue for many NC voters
Stephanie Killian can pinpoint the moment that health care became the overriding issue in how she votes.
It was three years ago when her son, Jacob, was born with a rare, congenital heart defect. He underwent open-heart surgery before he was five months old.
Her focus was only amplified this year when she was diagnosed with breast cancer. She has since undergone a mastectomy and four months of chemo.
“Since 2017, health care became — and forever will be — our family’s top singular voting issue,” said Killian, 37, a Mooresville lawyer. “My life depends on it, and my 3-year-old’s life depends on it.”
In a year when a worldwide pandemic, economic disruptions and protests over racial inequities have dominated headlines, health care has reemerged as a priority for many North Carolina voters.
Last week’s death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg cast the future of the Affordable Care Act in doubt. The law is scheduled for a high court hearing in November. Her passing also put into play the fate of Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that legalized abortion rights.
Five weeks before the election, President Donald Trump outlined his own health care plan in Charlotte Thursday. With the stroke of a pen, he pledged to bring down health care costs and protect coverage of pre-existing conditions for millions of Americans even as the administration fights the Affordable Care Act in court.
Meanwhile the coronavirus pandemic continues to rage, disrupting the economy and daily lives. The state has seen nearly 200,000 cases of COVID-19 and 3,400 deaths.
Candidates are running ads on health care. So are outside groups such as Health Care Voter and Change Now, which are in the midst of a seven-figure campaign targeting N.C. voters with diabetes and other pre-existing conditions.
A study by the Kaiser Family Foundation, a health care policy center, found that 1.7 million non-elderly North Carolinians have pre-existing conditions that once would have disqualified them from health care coverage. Another study found 600,000 North Carolinians would lose coverage if the ACA is overturned.
Liz Hamel, a vice president of the foundation, said a recent Kaiser poll showed health care lagging behind the economy and other issues. She said it’s too soon to know the impact of the sudden Supreme Court vacancy on that, especially in a year “saturated” with things to worry about.
“It’s possible that the people who are going to be motivated by this are the people who were already paying attention,” Hamel told the Observer.
Rosemary Enobakhare, campaign director of Health Care Votes, believes a lot of people are paying attention.
“This is an election about health care,” she said.
Lowering health care costs
Two recent polls found N.C. voters give Biden an edge on health care issues.
A Kaiser Family Foundation survey found that by double-digits voters preferred Biden to preserve both the Affordable Care Act and protections for patients with pre-existing conditions.
And the Commonwealth Fund, which tracks health policy, polled voters in North Carolina and 9 other battleground states. The poll showed 56% of N.C. voters said Biden was the better choice to handle the fallout from COVID-19 while 58% said he would better protect people with pre-existing conditions. And 51% said he, not Trump, would lower the cost of health care.
Thursday in Charlotte, Trump laid out a plan he said would save Americans money while giving them more health care choices. He also announced that Medicare beneficiaries will get a $200 payment for prescription drugs. And he said he’s authorizing the importation of cheaper drugs from Canada.
Dr. Clare Gray, a physician with Hickory’s Catawba Valley Medical Center, told the Observer this week that he supports the president’s work on health care. He said he’s focused on incremental reforms that would take government out of medicine.
”We’re fighting to get the patient and the physician back at the center of the American health care system,” Gray said.
Earlier this year an Elon University Poll, in conjunction with the Charlotte Observer and the News & Observer of Raleigh, asked voters whether the government should be more involved in paying for health care. More than half — 51 percent — said it should compared with 31 percent who said the government should be less involved, and 15 percent who said the government is involved at the right level.
Asked to rate the health care system, the largest portion of N.C. voters — 34% — gave it a “C,” with 25% giving it a “D.” Twenty percent gave it a “B” and 16% an “F.” Just 3% gave it an “A.”
Driving votes on both sides
Rachael Head, 22, said Ginsburg’s death has intensified her motivation as a volunteer for Planned Parenthood Action.
“I was always really energized by promoting women’s right to choose,” said Head, a recent UNC Chapel Hill graduate. “It’s even more important now knowing that her vacancy put this very right in jeopardy.”
Tami Fitzgerald, executive director of the N.C. Values Coalition, said Ginsburg’s death also has made her more motivated — to vote for Republican U.S. Sen. Thom Tillis. She said she and other evangelicals were “on the fence” about Tillis.
“However, what Senator Tillis has done . . . since Justice Ginsburg passed has galvanized my support for him,” she said. “His strong, clear voice encouraging the president to exercise his Constitutional duty to nominate a replacement quickly and his assurance that he will support the president’s nominee and work to confirm that nominee has helped me see how important it is to have him return to the U.S. Senate.”
Amber Hernandez of Asheboro is still undecided in the presidential race. But the mother of four knows that affordable health care is a priority. She works one day a week as a cashier and said she finds even the ACA unaffordable. She’s still looking at Biden’s and Trump’s positions on health care.
Killian, who’s voting for Biden, said the ACA “is on life support.” She’s volunteering with a group to promote the health care issue.
“Regardless of your politics, all of us are going to get sick at some time,” she said. “All of us need to be able to access affordable health care.”
This story was originally published September 25, 2020 at 12:50 PM.
