Aitlin Oprysko noted that as the Democratic presidential field continues to grapple with plans to address health care, a significant majority of Democratic voters are more likely to back a 2020 primary candidate who supports “Medicare for All” than building on the Affordable Care Act, a new poll found.

According to the POLITICO/Morning Consult poll out Wednesday, 65 percent of Democratic primary voters would be more likely to support a candidate who wants to institute a single-payer health care system like Medicare for All; 13 percent said they’d be less likely to back a candidate based on that support.

While the Democratic base has essentially demanded that it’s White House hopefuls offer up a plan for universal health care, the party has devolved into infighting over the nuances of such plans, centering almost entirely on the role of private insurers in the health care market.

“Democrats are increasingly more inclined to back a 2020 candidate who supports Medicare for All versus revamping Obamacare,” said Tyler Sinclair, Morning Consult’s vice president. “In January, 57 percent of Democrats said they would be more likely to vote for a candidate who backs a Medicare for All health system over expanding the Affordable Care Act. That number has now risen to 65 percent.”

The issue has been one of the more contentious policy divides rippling through the extensive primary field. White House hopefuls like former Vice President Joe Biden, former Rep. John Delaney, and Sen. Michael Bennet have railed against the idea, arguing instead for building on Obamacare.

Biden’s front-runner status thus far has come close to being threatened by only Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, two of the most vocal proponents of Medicare for All, while some of the idea’s most vocal detractors have failed to gain traction in the race or have already dropped out.

But Biden this week made his most forceful case yet against scrapping one of the signature achievements of his tenure as vice president, dropping a one-minute ad in which he explains that health care is “deeply personal” to him.

“Obamacare is personal to me,” he says at the end of the spot, in which he invokes the unexpected death of his first wife and daughter and the cancer fight of his late son. “When I see the president try to tear it down, and others proposing to replace it and start over, that’s personal to me, too.”

Meanwhile, Sen. Kamala Harris’ faltering in recent polls has coincided with greater scrutiny and wavering when it comes to the role of private insurers in a potential Harris administration. Her plan has drawn criticism from both ends of the spectrum even as it’s been praised by health policy experts and former Obama administration officials.

On the left flank, Sanders and Warren have defended the proposal in the face of criticism from the center lane of the primary, and Sanders’ campaign has aggressively seized on Harris’ muddled messaging.

Overall, 53 percent of voters support Medicare for All, though fewer — 45 percent — say a candidate’s support for Medicare for All would make them more likely to vote for that candidate in a general election over one who would prioritize improving on Obamacare. The survey suggests a level of public support for single-payer health care that could take some sting out of Republicans’ plans to make Medicare for All a four-letter word they can wield against Democrats up and down the ballot in 2020.

The POLITICO/Morning Consult survey was conducted online Aug. 23-25 among a national sample of 1,987 registered voters, including 768 Democratic voters. Results from the full survey have a margin of error of plus or minus 2 points.

Morning Consult is a nonpartisan media and technology company that provides data-driven research and insights on politics, policy and business strategy. But here is a slightly different view on the desires of those Democrats!

Democrats Want Medicare for All … or Maybe Not

Yuval Rosenberg of the Fiscal Times reported that a new Morning Consult/Politico poll finds support among Democrats rising for candidates that favor Medicare for All overbuilding on the Affordable Care Act. The survey found a 52-point margin of support — the share of those who said they would be more likely to back a candidate minus the share who said they would be less likely — for a candidate that backs Medicare for All, up from 35 points in January.

The poll surveyed 1,987 registered voters, including 768 Democratic voters, and had an overall margin of error of 2 percentage points. The Democratic subsample has a margin of error of 4 percentage points.

The Morning Consult results are similar to the findings of a new Monmouth University poll in which 58% of Democratic voters say it is very important to them that the party nominate someone who supports “Medicare for All.” But the poll also found that most voters, 53%, say they want a system that allows people to opt into Medicare while maintaining a private insurance market — what policy experts call a “public option.” Just 22% say they want to switch to a system where a government-run health plan replaces private insurance.

That may help explain why the Morning Consult poll finds that former vice president Joe Biden, who favors expanding the ACA by adding a public option, holds a 13-point advantage over Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who has championed Medicare for All.

Another explanation: Voters have other issues on their minds. Leslie Dach, campaign chair for health care advocacy group Protect Our Care, told Morning Consult that the latest poll results showing continued support for Biden demonstrate that Democratic voters are driven by a desire to remove President Trump from the office more than by questions about health care. And on the issue of health care, they’re more responsive to pocketbook issues like drug costs and protections for people with pre-existing conditions than to broader questions about the future structure of the U.S. health care system.

Bernie Sanders calls for eliminating all medical debt at the South Carolina event

Bernie Sanders teases plan to eliminate all medical debt and how ridiculous it sounds and really is!!

Andrew Craft or Fox News reported that the Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., told an audience in South Carolina Friday that he is working on legislation that would “eliminate medical debt in this country.”

Sanders made the remark during a question-and-answer period following a town hall meeting in Florence on “Medicare-for-All.” A female attendee explained to Sanders that she doesn’t make enough money to qualify for ObamaCare and has a large amount of medical debt not covered by insurance.

When the woman asked Sanders if he had a plan for that, the self-described democratic socialist told her: “In another piece of legislation that we’re offering, we’re gonna eliminate medical debt in this country.”

The Sanders campaign confirmed to Fox News that the proposal was new, but details were scant.

“We are introducing legislation that would end all medical debt in this country,” Sanders told reporters as he departed the town hall. “The bottom line is it is an insane and cruel system, which says to people that they have to go deeply into debt or go bankrupt because of what? Because they came down with cancer or they came down with heart disease or they came down with Alzheimer’s, or whatever …

“In the midst of a dysfunctional healthcare system, we have to say to people that you cannot go bankrupt or end up in financial duress,” Sanders added. “That is cruel and something we’ve gotta handle. This is something that we’re working on and that we will introduce.”

Sanders has long touted his “Medicare-for-All” proposal, which would replace job-based and individual private health insurance with a government-run plan that guarantees coverage for all with no premiums, deductibles and only minimal copays for certain services. Health care has become a key issue in South Carolina, which is among the Republican-led states that turned down Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act.

Sanders’ legislation does not specify new revenues, instead of providing a separate list of “options” that include higher taxes on the wealthy, corporations and employers while promising the middle class will be better off.

“You’re going to be paying more in taxes,” Sanders said Friday to a man asking how he’d benefit from Medicare for All if his employer currently pays for most of his premiums. “But at the end of the day, you’re going to be paying less for health care than you are right now. It will be comprehensive.”

The healthcare industry has become a favorite whipping boy for Sanders, who told his audience Friday: “Thirty years from now your kids and your grandchildren will be asking you was it really true? That there were people in America who could not go to the doctor when they wanted to? Was it really true that people went bankrupt because they could not pay their healthcare bills? And you will have to tell them, ‘Yes, it was.’ But together we are going to end that obscenity and we’re going to end it in the next few years.”

The new proposal is not the only debt that Sanders has called for canceling. He has repeatedly called for the elimination of $1.6 trillion in student loan debt as well and calling for public college and universities to be tuition-free.

According to the RealClearPolitics polling average, Sanders is the second choice among Democrats nationwide, garnering 17.1 percent of the vote. Former Vice President Joe Biden holds a comfortable lead with 28.9 percent support, while Elizabeth Warren is narrowly behind Sanders in third place at 16.5 percent support.

Sanders: Medicare for All means more taxes, better coverage

Meg Kinnard of the Associated Press reported that health care was the focus of Democratic presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders’ second day of campaigning in pivotal early-voting South Carolina, where lack of Medicaid expansion has left thousands unable to obtain health coverage.

The Vermont senator focused on “Medicare for All,” his signature proposal replacing job-based and individual private health insurance with a government-run plan that guarantees coverage for all with no premiums, deductibles and only minimal copays for certain services.

“While this health care system is not working for working families, it is working for one group of people,” Sanders told a crowd of 300 on Friday. “The function of a rational health care system is not to make billions for insurance companies and drug companies. It is to provide health care to every man woman and child as a human right.”

Health care and how to reform the nation’s system is a critical debate among the candidates vying for the Democratic nomination. It’s under intense focus in states like South Carolina, home to the first-in-the-South 2020 primary, which is among the Republican-led states that turned down Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act.

As a result of that decision, according to healthinsurance.org, a health insurance industry watchdog, about 92,000 South Carolinians are in the “coverage gap,” without access to insurance. This group of mostly low-income residents doesn’t qualify for subsidies on the exchange and is heavily reliant on emergency rooms and community clinics for care.

The lack of expansion has also had institutional ramifications, leading to the closures of hospitals in rural areas, tasked with serving a wide-reaching population and heavily reliant on Medicaid funds. According to the Sheps Center for Health Services Research at the University of North Carolina, 113 rural hospitals have closed since January 2010. Four of those facilities were in South Carolina.

While the overall notion of “Medicare for All” remains popular, some recent polling has shown softening support for the single-payer system, with hesitation at the idea of relinquishing private coverage altogether. Under Sanders’ legislation, it would be unlawful for insurers or employers to offer coverage for benefits provided by the new government-run plan.

Nationwide, 55% of Democrats and independent voters who lean Democratic said in a poll last month they’d prefer building on President Barack Obama’s Affordable Care Act instead of replacing it with Medicare for All. The survey by the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation found that 39% would prefer Medicare for All. Majorities of liberals and moderates concurred.

Sanders’ legislation does not specify new revenues, instead of providing a separate list of “options” that include higher taxes on the wealthy, corporations and employers while promising the middle class will be better off.

“You’re going to be paying more in taxes,” Sanders said Friday to a man asking how he’d benefit from Medicare for All if his employer currently pays for most of his premiums. “But at the end of the day, you’re going to be paying less for health care than you are right now. It will be comprehensive.”

Sanders tallied up other personal expenses that would go away under his plan, including co-pays and medication costs over a $200-per-year cap. Sanders said he was also working on a proposal to eliminate medical debt, which he called the leading cause of consumer bankruptcy.

His campaign provided more details on Saturday, saying the plan would cancel an existing $81 billion in existing, past-due medical debt, with the federal government negotiating and paying off bills in collections. Sanders is proposing changes to a 2005 bankruptcy bill, which he blames for further hampering Americans’ abilities to regain their financial footing.

In early states including South Carolina, some voters continue to voice confusion as to exactly what various candidates in the vast Democratic field mean when they advocate for pieces of a Medicare for All plan. California Sen. Kamala Harris’ new plan would preserve a role for private insurance. New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker is open to step-by-step approaches.

Others including former Vice President Joe Biden have been blunt in criticizing the government-run system envisioned by Sanders.

Biden health plan aims far beyond the legacy of ‘Obamacare’

Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar of the Associated Press noted that wrapping himself in the legacy of “Obamacare,” Joe Biden is offering restless Democrats a health care proposal that goes far beyond it, calling for a government plan almost anybody can join but stopping short of a total system remake. But why does he propose a health care plan, Obamacare, that he was sooooo proud of??

Recent polls show softening support for the full government-run system championed by Sen. Bernie Sanders, and Biden is pitching his approach in a new ad aimed at Democrats in Iowa. His “public option” would give virtually everyone the choice of a government plan like Medicare, as an alternative to private coverage, not a substitute.

“The fact of the matter is health care is personal to me,” Biden says in the ad, recalling his own family experiences with illness and loss. “Obamacare is personal to me. When I see the president try to tear it down and others propose to replace it and start over, that’s personal to me, too. We’ve got to build on what we did because every American deserves affordable health care.”

Biden’s health care gambit puts him somewhere center-left on the spectrum of ideas from Democratic presidential candidates.

Sanders and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren are solidly behind “Medicare for All,” the government-run “single-payer” approach. California Sen. Kamala Harris is offering to retain private plans within a government system. Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet who is proposing a limited public option focused on areas with little insurer competition, calls it “the most effective way to cover everyone and lower costs.”

Sanders, in a veiled swipe, has accused Biden of “tinkering around the edges.” But Biden’s more ambitious public option would be open to people around the country, including those with employer coverage. That would set up a competition between a government plan and the mainstay of private coverage in the U.S.

“The Biden plan is modest in comparison to ‘Medicare for All,’ but it is by no means modest by historical standards,” said Larry Levitt of the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation. “It goes well beyond even the most progressive proposals during the Affordable Care Act debate. It does show how the health care debate has shifted when this is considered a moderate proposal.”

Here’s a look:

THE BLUEPRINT

President Barack Obama’s former vice president builds on the ACA to address what former Democratic Senate aide John McDonough calls its “shortcomings, weaknesses, and pain points.”

Biden would provide more generous subsidies for “Obamacare’s” private policies, also lowering deductibles and copays. He’d let solidly middle-class people qualify for help paying their premiums, responding to complaints that they’re now priced out.

That’s for starters.

Biden adds his public option plan, something Obama couldn’t get through Congress when Democrats controlled it.

Biden’s version would be modeled on Medicare and open to just about any U.S. citizen or legal resident. One of its goals would be to provide free coverage for low-income people in states that have refused the ACA’s Medicaid expansion, including Texas and Florida.

And in a landmark change, Biden would open the public plan to people with access to job-based insurance if that’s what they want. Most workers don’t have such a choice now.

Campaign policy director Stef Feldman said Biden feels strongly that people with workplace coverage should have another choice.

It’s unclear how many people would switch from employer coverage to the public option, but the Kaiser Foundation’s Levitt notes, “It would be a voluntary shift on the part of workers.”

Under the plan, people who qualify for ACA subsidies would be able to use that money for public option premiums. “The public option and private insurance will hold each other accountable,” Feldman said.

But even as it gives consumers more choices, the public plan could undermine employer coverage, particularly if it draws away younger and healthier workers.

A coalition of insurers, hospitals and drug makers formed to fight “Medicare for All” is trying to derail the public option as well.

“It would be a dramatic policy change,” said McDonough, who teaches at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. The prospect of payments pegged to Medicare’s lower rates “is already alarming the provider community.”

Another part of Biden’s plan would tackle the high cost of prescription drugs, an issue that President Donald Trump has sought to address.

His most significant idea would limit launch prices for cutting-edge drugs that can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. He’d also hold pharmaceutical price increases to the inflation rate, allow Medicare to negotiate with drugmakers, and clear the way for patients to import drugs from abroad.

Overall, Biden’s campaign estimates his plan would cover 97% of those eligible.

He’d also restore Obama’s unpopular fines on people who go without health insurance, which were repealed by Congress.

THE POOR AND THE MIDDLE CLASS

“Obamacare” and the Republican backlash against it had unintended consequences both for low-income uninsured people and for middle-class consumers who once purchased their own policies but can no longer afford the high premiums.

Many GOP-led states have turned down the ACA’s Medicaid expansion. Nationally, nearly 5 million low-income people would gain coverage if all states expanded Medicaid. Biden would enroll them in the public option at no cost to them or their state.

That might well upset leaders in mostly Democratic states that embraced the Medicaid expansion and are helping pay for it. But campaign policy director Feldman says Biden “is done with” letting state politics interfere with coverage.

For middle-class people who buy their own health insurance, Biden would lift the ACA’s income limit on subsidies to help pay premiums.

ACA critic Robert Laszewski calls that a welcome fix. “Biden has done what needed to be done,” said Laszewski, a consultant and blogger. “The fundamental problem is that the middle class can’t afford the Obamacare policy.”

THE COST

After expected savings on prescription drugs and elsewhere, the Biden campaign estimates the plan’s net cost at $750 billion over 10 years, paid for by raising taxes on upper-income people and on investment income.

By comparison, “Medicare for All” is projected to cost $30 trillion to $40 trillion over 10 years.

While Biden’s plan clearly would cost less, health economist Gail Wilensky says she’s skeptical of the campaign number.

“Campaigns want to underestimate the cost and overestimate the benefits and make the financing sound easier than it will be,” said Wilensky, a longtime Republican adviser.

And on and on the discussion goes as to what the eventual Democratic presidential candidate will actually stick with and possibly what we all may have to live with. More on this discussion in the many weeks before and after the 2020 election.

Hoping that you all are enjoying your Labor Day weekend and the “end” of summer!