The House Oversight Committee on Tuesday is scheduled to hold the first hearing on Medicare for All legislation since the coronavirus pandemic struck in 2020, exposing deep and fatal flaws at the heart of the United States' for-profit healthcare system.
Set to begin at 9:00 am ET, the hearing will examine Reps. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) and Debbie Dingell's (D-Mich.) Medicare for All Act and will feature testimony from a number of experts and advocates, including Be a Hero co-executive director Ady Barkan, emergency physician Uche Blackstock, and economist Jeffrey Sachs.
"Americans deserve a healthcare system that guarantees health and medical services to all," Rep. Cori Bush (D-Mo.), a member of the oversight panel and one of 121 House co-sponsors of the Medicare for All Act, said last week in a statement announcing the hearing.
Watch the hearing live:
As the hearing kicked off, Jayapal--the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus--said that "the pandemic has made it clear now more than ever that we must guarantee healthcare as a human right with no copays, no deductibles, and no premiums."
"We need Medicare for All now, when nearly 100 million people are uninsured or underinsured in the richest nation on the planet," she added. "There's no excuse for this broken system--where parents have to choose between taking their kid to the doctor or paying rent. Today, we take a major step forward on this critical legislation in the House Oversight Committee."
"The path ahead is tough," Jayapal continued, "but Medicare for All is necessary, popular, and most importantly will save thousands of lives. I'm going to continue fighting to make it the law of the land."
