President Trump gave his first State of the Union Tuesday
night, setting the stage for the primary health care issues the administration
wants to address this year. Key priorities included the opioid crisis and
rising drug prices, while no reference was made to further changes to the
Affordable Care Act (ACA).
Trump highlighted the health care component of the tax
bill, the repeal of the individual mandate, passed in late 2017, saying, “we repealed the core of disastrous
ObamaCare.”
The president, however, stopped short of asking for further
rollback of the signature health care law. In his first address to a joint
session of Congress, Trump called for a full “repeal and replace” of the ACA. While
the fee for not purchasing health insurance is repealed, other major components of the law remain intact, including the Medicaid expansion, insurance exchanges and
consumer protections.
Trump also stated, “one of [his] greatest priorities is to
reduce the price of prescription drugs.” He said his administration will be
dedicated to “fixing the injustice
of high drug prices” but offered little more in terms of what kinds of policy
the administration will enact.
The president renewed his focus on the opioid crisis, and
said he’s “committed to fighting the drug epidemic and helping get treatment
for those in need.” In August, Trump called the opioid epidemic a national
emergency, a declaration which freed up $57,000 from the U.S.’s Public Health
Emergency Fund.
No comments:
Post a Comment