Cut Healthcare Costs
What We're Up Against
No company should rake in billions of dollars in profits while their customers ration medicine. But today in this state we have great grandmothers rationing insulin so they can afford to feed the kids they’re raising.
No one should go bankrupt because they’re sick. And yet big pharma companies and insurance companies keep watching their stock prices rise, while medical bills are the leading cause of bankruptcy in America today.
All West Virginians should be able to access good health care. Period.
Our Plan
- Expanding Medicaid to include dental coverage.
- Expanding prevention services and rural health care access.
- Ban “balance billing,” also known as “surprise billing.”
- Support “price tag” laws, and other efforts to educate and inform patients about the cost of medical procedures.
- Use our State Bank to buy back and consolidate medical debt on behalf of West Virginia citizens, enabling them to pay it back at the current value of the debt.
- Make it illegal for creditors to garnish wages for people with medical debt.
- Eliminate the IDD waiver waiting list.
- Quadruple the reach of the state’s free clinics, with a particular focus on getting mobile health care units, care hubs, dental care, and harm reduction services to rural areas.
- Support the expansion of school-based health clinics.
- Fight hard for on-going opioid lawsuits against pharmaceutical companies and spearhead anti-trust lawsuits against additional health care industry players.
Reverse Amendment 1 and guarantee access to reproductive healthcare for women across West Virginia. - End red tape for Medicaid and SNAP recipients.
- Build 50 sustainable Recovery Centers in the next ten years to provide coordinated, wraparound services for people in recovery and people with mental illness. Fund proven wellness programs in afterschool programs and communities.
- Permit Medicaid dollars to be used for Patient Navigators for high-need populations.
No one politician or slate of candidates can win this plan alone. We need you.
If you have an idea for how to make this plan stronger, or if you would like to lend a hand to win it, contact our co-chair Stephen Smith at stephen@wvcantwait.com.