A huge, huge story broke just
before the holiday weekend, but hardly anyone is talking about it. Let’s change
that, shall we? Here’s the story: Donald Trump and Dr. Oz* are rolling out a
pilot program to fundamentally change Medicare. They want to require senior
citizens to get prior authorization for some healthcare services, and here’s
the kicker: Artificial Intelligence (AI) gets to decide whether medical care is
approved or not.
Believe it or not, it actually
gets worse when you dig into the details of these “AI Death Panels,” which
we’ll do in a moment, but if you’re already caught up on this story, here’s
what you can do right now:
Introducing AI Death Panels
Medicare has historically covered
more procedures, with fewer hoops to jump through, than for-profit insurance
companies. Whereas private insurers callously limit care and require “prior
authorization” before covering many services or procedures, Medicare offers
broad coverage that’s comparatively transparent and simple.
Not anymore, if Trump and Oz get
their way. The Trump regime wants to introduce prior authorization -- one of
the most hated aspects of private insurance -- to Medicare, and they’re
outsourcing those life-changing authorization decisions to unproven AI companies.
It gets even worse: AI developers
will be paid based on the value of requested services or procedures they reject
-- meaning AI companies would directly profit from denying needed care
to seniors.
In short, if a computer program
decides that you “don’t need” a medical procedure -- even if your doctor
recommended it -- an AI executive gets paid while you get left holding the bag.
Remember when the GOP invented the term "death panel" in their scare
campaign to stop the Affordable Care Act? That was totally manufactured
nonsense. This is actually happening. Trump is rolling out real-life AI
Death Panels.
OUR DEMANDS
These for-profit AI Death Panels
will roll out this January in six pilot states: Arizona, New Jersey, Ohio,
Oklahoma, Texas, and Washington. The pilots will reportedly be limited to about
17 procedures to start, but if they achieve their goal -- cutting costs by
denying a lot of people a lot of care -- they could expand to more procedures
and more states.
This attack on Medicare
creates massive political risk for Trump and his GOP enablers in Congress. Medicare
is one of the most popular public programs in US history, and hardworking
people typically don’t respond well when politicians interfere with their
health decisions.
That gives us an outside
chance of swaying enough congressional Republicans to take action to stop AI
Death Panels before they roll out -- or failing that, make them pay a HUGE
political price in 2026.
Step one: Let ‘em hear it. Give
‘em hell.
This is just the latest dystopian
move in Trump and Republicans’ campaign to systematically dismantle our
healthcare system at the behest of corporate backers and billionaires. With a
huge federal funding deadline around the corner, now is the time to fight back
hard.
In solidarity,
Indivisible Team
P.S. We focused much of this
email on the Republican side of the aisle. But we need to put pressure on
Democratic members of Congress, too, because it’s important they use all their
leverage to protect healthcare. Whether Dems or Republicans represent you in Washington, email
your senators and representative now.
*Did you forget that Trump
picked (and GOP Senators confirmed) another disgraced TV star, Dr. Oz, to run
the federal agency in charge of Medicare and Medicaid? That’s right, millions
of seniors’ healthcare is in the hands of a famous snake-oil salesman!
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