"How the Senate Paved the Way for Coronavirus Profiteering, And How Congress Could Undo It"

Poignantly relevant to the current presidential primary…

Ryan Grim and Aída Chávez reporting in The Intercept:

…The public puts in the money, and private companies keep whatever profits they can command. But it wasn’t always that way. Before 1995, drug companies were required to sell drugs funded with public money at a reasonable price. Under the Clinton administration, that changed.

In the 1994 midterms, the Republican Revolution, built largely around a reaction to Bill Clinton’s attempt to reform the health care system, swept Democrats out of Congress. On its heels, in April 1995, the Clinton administration capitulated to pharmaceutical industry pressure and rescinded the longstanding “reasonable pricing” rule.

…

The move was controversial, and a House member from Vermont, independent Bernie Sanders, offered an amendment to reinstate the rule. It failed on a largely party-line vote, 242-180.

Then in 2000, Sanders authored and passed a bipartisan amendment in the House to reimpose the “reasonable pricing” rule. In the Senate, a similar measure was pushed by the late Paul Wellstone of Minnesota.

“Many in Congress find it hard to argue with Sanders’ line that ‘Americans must pay twice for life-saving drugs, first as taxpayers to develop the drug and then as consumers to pad pharmaceutical profits,’” Nature wrote at the time.

Then-Sen. Joe Biden of Delaware voted to table Wellstone’s amendment, and it was defeated 56-39.

Medicare for All will create jobs, reduce our taxes, and save us trillions in tax $

Jason Lemon, writing about a couple recent studies in Newsweek:

A new analysis of the economic impact of a Medicare for All health care reform, like the signature policy proposal of Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, suggests that such a plan would not only increase wages for workers but also create additional jobs.

…

"The grain of truth in some of the claims is that, like any productivity improvement, the adoption of a reform like M4A would require the redeployment of workers from one sector (the health insurance and medical billing complex) to other sectors (mostly the delivery of health care)," he wrote. "But there is little in the M4A-induced redeployment of workers that would greatly stress the American labor market over and above the uncertainty and churn that characterizes this labor market every year."

…

…a study by researchers at Yale University, the University of Florida and the University of Maryland published in mid-February found that universal health care would actually save about $450 billion per year in health care costs. Additionally, it projected that a Medicare for All system would prevent at least 60,000 unnecessary deaths every year, as tens of millions of uninsured Americans would receive full health coverage under the system.

Medicare for All is a necessity, and the clearest moral choice

Healthcare is a human right, and we should pay for it through progressive taxation, and make it free at point of service. By forcing people to pay at multiple points in the system, no matter how poor they may be, we doom emergency response.

@peterkrupa thinking out loud on Twitter about being tested for COVID-19:

there is no way in hell i'm going to get tested for covid-19 unless i'm dying, and i guarantee you millions of Americans are thinking the same.

— Peter Krupa (@peterkrupa) March 9, 2020

Continued, via ThreadReader:

even if the cost of the covid-19 test is covered, what about related care? the first thing they do is test you for flu to rule it out. boom, that'll be $700, for nothing, because i don't care if i have flu or not. 

and then if i get the covid-19 test... what? oh good job, i've spent hundreds, possibly thousands of dollars of my own money to add a single data point to the body of public knowledge on this epidemic? fuck off, that's what i pay taxes for, i'm not doing this. 

to say nothing of the stigma so many workers with mild symptoms will face... the pressure to skip work and lose a paycheck, etc., which they won't do, because they have to pay rent. 

all the incentives in the US healthcare system are lined up AGAINST people voluntarily contributing to the public knowledge of what's going on with this outbreak. it's a disaster. 

The global response to COVID-19 shows the hypocrisy of our response to climate change

The threat of death by a novel disease has nearly the whole world in mobilization against it. When this comes to pass, let it show that we can and should do the same for the mortal threat of climate change.

— Diego Morales 🌹 (@DiegoAlways_) March 12, 2020

"Trump’s Speech Shows He Has No Idea What to Do About the Coronavirus"

Trump’s gross negligence and incompetence are Constitutionally impeachable offenses.

Jonathan Chait covers the ignorance and incompetence in Trump’s address regarding the coronavirus outbreak, in New York magazine:

Trump’s speech had no mention of the central problem in the American response to the coronavirus, which is the lack of a functioning testing regime. Having falsely promised on Friday that everybody who currently wants a test can get one, Trump simply ignored the question altogether. At the moment, people who have symptoms do not know what they can do about it. The number is due to explode, and Trump offered them no guidance.

…

Even the nonsensical measure of the travel ban contains its own nonsensical exemption for the United Kingdom. Why Trump left out a country that has far more confirmed cases than many of the countries whose residents are banned, he did not say. Political affinity with its Prime Minister? A personal business stake for his European golf resorts, which are coincidentally located in exempted countries? No account was even offered.

Perhaps most astonishingly, the White House had to retract two policy announcements that Trump erroneously made either because he failed to read his text properly, or his speechwriters failed to describe his position. Trump announced his European travel ban would apply to “trade and cargo,” before the White House announced this was an error. Trump also told his audience, “I met with the leaders of health insurance industry who have agreed to waive all co-payments for coronavirus treatments, extend insurance coverage to these treatments and to prevent surprise medical billing.” The Insurance Industry quickly announced it had only agreed to cover testing, not treatment, for the coronavirus.

The cliche about Trump’s presidency is that it is malevolence tempered by incompetence. His haplessness would undermine his corruption and authoritarianism. But now, finally, the country faces a crisis in which Trump’s incompetence will not save us from him. His wholesale unfitness was on bright display from the Oval Office. It may be the most unsettling moment yet of this bleak era.

What to do if you get COVID-19

@smashingteacups, an RN, explains what to do if you contract the virus:

Via threadreader:

I know we’re all tired of hearing/talking about it, but one thing I HAVEN’T really seen going around is advice for what happens if you DO get coronavirus (many of us will), only advice for how to try to AVOID it. So as your friendly neighborhood RN, a wee thread: 

Things you should *actually* buy ahead of time (Erm, not sure what the obsession with toilet paper is?): Kleenex, Acetaminophen (Tylenol) in 350 mg tablets, Ibuprofen (Advil) in 200 mg tablets, Mucinex, Robitussin or DayQuil/NyQuil, whatever your cough medicine of choice is. 

If you don’t have a humidifier, that would also be a good thing to get. (You can also just turn the shower on hot and sit in the bathroom breathing in the steam). Also a good time to make a big batch of your favorite soup to freeze and have on hand. 

If you have a history of asthma and you have a prescription inhaler, make sure the one you have isn’t expired and refill it/get a new one if it is. 

You basically just want to prepare as though you know you’re going to get a nasty respiratory bug like bronchitis or pneumonia. You just have the foresight to know it’s coming. 

For symptom management, use the meds I mentioned. For a fever over 101, alternate Tylenol and Advil so you’re taking a dose of one or the other every 3 hours. Use both cough suppressants and expectorants (most cough meds have both). Drink a ton, hydrate hydrate. Rest lots. 

You should not be leaving your house except to go to the doctor, and if you do, wear a mask (regular is fine, you don’t need an N95). You DO NOT NEED TO GO TO THE ER unless you are having trouble breathing or your fever is very high and unmanaged with meds. 

90% of healthy adult cases thus far have been managed at home with basic rest/hydration/over-the-counter meds. We don’t want to clog the ERs unless you’re actually in distress. The hospital beds will be used for people who actively need oxygen/breathing treatments/IV fluids. 

If you have a pre-existing lung condition (COPD, emphysema, lung cancer) or are on immunosuppressants, now is a great time to talk to your PCP or specialist about what they would like you to do if you get sick. They might have plans to get you admitted and bypass the ER entirely. 

One major relief to you parents is that kids do VERY well with coronavirus— they usually bounce back in a few days, no one under 18 has died, and almost no kids have required hospitalization (unless they have a lung disease like CF). Just use pediatric dosing of the same meds. 

One fundamental difference between Bernie and Biden

Van Jones just dropped a gem: “Biden views Trump as a disruption of the status quo. Bernie views Trump as a result of the status quo.” Most important distinction.

— Ross M. Tedder🌹 (@TedderRM) March 11, 2020

"Democrats, You Really Do Not Want To Nominate Joe Biden"

We need to reject Joe Biden. He represents everything wrong with the “civility"-first faction of Democratic elitism that’s been in charge of the Party for the last thirty-plus years. The kowtowing to power, the emphasis on “bipartisan” compromises no matter how damaging they may be to the services we all agree are good and necessary and pay for through our taxes. Biden isn’t the devil; he just never realized that’s who he was making deals with. He was a convenient mark for the real bad actors. We needed better, to resist corruption and evil. He should have been replaced decades ago, yet here he still is, and here the national Democratic Party is yet again rallying around an amoral elitist because they sense their power’s being threatened by the grassroots. If this election comes down to Biden and Trump, then we’re left with Trump the fascist, or Biden the weak-willed opposition coopted by the fascists.

Bernie Sanders is still in this race. If you haven’t yet, please vote for the only person remaining who understands the insidiousness of power, and whose plans we desperately need to begin reversing the ever-widening gap in power and control between the public and the oligarchs.

If you’re not convinced Biden was so bad, or his presidency wouldn’t be such a disaster (if not the nightmare that a second Trump term would be), read Nathan J. Robinson’s latest essay in Current Affairs, thoroughly debunking Biden’s tenure as decent:

Because you are a Democrat, I assume you believe in things. You deplore racism, sexism, and inequality. You believe that people shouldn’t die because they can’t afford healthcare, you are disturbed by needless destructive wars, you think climate change is real and urgent, and you think Democratic social programs like Medicare and Social Security are vital for keeping seniors comfortable in old age. You think the criminal punishment system can be harsh and excessive, that a woman’s right to choose is paramount, and that corporations shouldn’t take advantage of vulnerable people. Perhaps you wouldn’t describe yourself as a socialist like Bernie Sanders, but you do see how life for working people in America can be brutal and unfair, and you think it’s the government’s job to do something about it. The question, then, is which candidate can be trusted to best live up to your values, address the social problems that concern you, and fight for the things that are right. 

The reason many of us are so turned off by Joe Biden is that, over the course of a many-decade career in Washington, he has let us down on the key issues when it matters most. Joe Biden has shown himself to be fundamentally weak, unreliable, and dishonest. He gets taken advantage of by Republicans, and he seems more interested in making friends than advancing Democratic ideals. Biden, ultimately, is truly “just another politician”: a guy who will give you a warm smile and then sell you out behind closed doors, a person who will make terrible decisions and grubby deals and then cover them up with lies. He adopts a “middle class” image but sucks up to the rich and powerful, and has contempt for ordinary voters and their concerns. He’s a man with little integrity or moral character, whose choices in office have caused a lot of people a lot of harm.

…

Why would Biden do these things, you might ask? He clearly didn’t desire for hundreds of thousands of Iraqis to die, or for old people to suffer. But here’s an important thing to understand about Washington: The worst human consequences of political decision-making don’t come about because of outright malice, but because of indifference, self-interest, and ignorance. Politicians repeat facile dogmas about the need to “control the deficit” or “get tough on Saddam” without thinking about what the real-world effects of their actions are on the people whose benefits are cut and whose country is invaded. Insiders like Biden (who has been in Washington since 1972) are out of touch with what the world looks like for the people their policies affect. They listen only to the opinions of those who surround them, and those people are often self-interested lobbyists and donors. Someone like Biden is more interested in protecting his own position than on how his votes could impact people like you.