Join us in midtown Manhattan this Fri. June 10th at 12 noon as we join with health and social justice activists worldwide to collectively to demand that the US and European countries “end COVID monopolies” and “vaccinate and treat the world now!”  Our event is one of many Global Days of Actions organized by the People’s Vaccine Alliance during early June. They are being held prior to the the upcoming annual Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization (WTO) that begins on Sun. June 12 in Geneva.  The issue of the WTO adopting a comprehensive response to the COVID-19 (and future) pandemics will be one of the top agenda items.

Here in NYC, we and our allies who lead the #EndVaccineApartheidNYC campaign will be gathering for “Earth to Europe and the US: End COVID Monopolies Now!” We’ll be marching to the UN Missions of Switzerland, European Union, United Kingdom, Germany, and US, to call them out for not taking the necessary steps to stop the COVID-19 pandemic and save millions of lives, and deliver a letter of demands to each country’s UN Ambassador.

Schedule of event components:

• 12 noon — Gather in Grand Central Plaza, 622 Third Ave. (NW corner of East 40th St.)
• 12:05 — Swiss Mission to UN, 633 Third Ave. (NE corner of East 40th St.)
• 12:15 — European Union Mission to UN, 666 Third Ave. (NW corner of East 42nd St.)
• 12:30 — United Kingdom Mission to the UN, 885 2nd Ave. (NW cor. East 47th St.)
• 12:45 — Germany Mission to the UN, 871 1st Ave. (SW cor. East 49th St.)
• 12:55 — US Mission to the UN, 799 First Ave. (SW cor. 45th St.)

Since the fall of 2020, these five Western nations have stood in the way of efforts at the WTO to temporarily waive international intellectual property rights so that COVID-19 tests, treatments, and vaccines can be immediately mass produced and used everywhere around the world, particularly in the Global South. As a result, millions get sick and many die, the pandemic keeps spreading, and new viral variants emerge that threaten all of us everywhere.  Instead of protect everyday people everywhere, these countries are protecting #BigPharma’s pandemic profiteering.  Over 120 nations are supporting a proposal from India and South Africa for the WTO to adopt a comprehensive “TRIPS waiver” to end the global pandemic as quickly as possible.

Here is the Action Network event and Facebook event to share.

List of participating organizations [list in formation]:

• Center for Popular Democracy and CPD Action
• Health Global Access Project (HealthGAP)
• Housing Works
• Metro New York Health Care for All
• New York Trade Justice Coalition
• Physicians for a National Health Program, NY Metro Chapter
• Public Citizen Global Trade Watch
• Rise and Resist
• Showing Up for Racial Justice NYC

Contrary to the wishes of many, the COVID-19 pandemic is not yet over, and there’s still important work to do to put it and its consequences firmly behind us. June is going to be a crucial month for Congress to get some important pandemic bills done before summer arrives in July when much attention will shift from lawmaking to election campaigning.  

Here’s what needs to get over the finish line:

Continuing to Stop the Pandemic – Since March 2020, Congress has passed 6 bills to address the pandemic in various ways. Shockingly, the last round of funding authorized in March 2021 under the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) was not renewed by Congress this past March 2022 as part of a broad federal budget bill. Since then, much US funding for global programs has ceased, and domestic programs to pay for vaccines, testing, and treatment have begun to expire. The House did pass a stand-alone bill to restore such funding prior to their Easter-Passover break in mid-April.

However, the Senate has been gridlocked since then, for several reasons. One is political-ideological: the desire by the Republican Minority for the pandemic to be over-and-done-with as a public health crisis and shifting into a manageable “endemic” phase, regardless of reality. (Infection rates are going up again nationwide as we experience a new, fifth wave.) In addition, they want to use yet-to-be spent pandemic funding already made available to states under previous bills rather than appropriate new amounts, something many governors and Senate and House Majority members object to.  

Another unrelated but complicating factor concerns whether to continue or revoke use of Title 42 of the Public Health Service Act, a provision that allows federal immigration authorities to prohibit people from entering the US if they pose a public health threat. Early on in the pandemic, the Trump administration cynically and opportunistically invoked it as a general immigration control (vs. public health) measure, particularly with regard to people seeking asylum at the southern border. Now, the Centers for Disease Control believes that use of Title 42 is not necessary to protect public health since the pandemic is already widespread across the US. However, the Senate Republican Majority is seeking to attach a rider to a new pandemic funding bill that would keep Title 42 restrictions in place by law (vs. Executive Order, as is currently the case), again as a general immigration measure, which is a misuse of current public health law.

Recovering from the Pandemic – Last fall, the House passed the Build Back Better Act, a comprehensive bill to foster longer-term economic and social recovery from the pandemic. (Previous bills were primarily focused to provide immediate response and relief.) Since then, the Senate has been gridlocked over how to respond to the House bill. The Senate Majority has been working to craft a “budget reconciliation” bill that will likely be narrower in scope and ambition, with a focus on lowering Rx drug prices and out-of-pocket costs (see details below), responding to climate change, rebalancing our economy and tax system by raising taxes on large corporations and the ultra-rich, and paying down some of the accrued national debt. We are all awaiting and hoping for an agreement to be announced and legislative action taken very soon.

What’s already agreed upon to lower prescription drug prices and out-of-pocket costs as part of a new Senate bill:

• Directing Medicare to negotiate prices with drug corporations.
• Limiting how much drug corporations can raise drug prices each year to the rate of general inflation.
• Capping the total amount of co-pays for people on Medicare to $2,000 per year.
• Capping monthly co-pays for insulin to $35 per prescription.

Health advocates are also pushing for the inclusion of these health care measures as part of it:

• Extension of health insurance premium subsidies for Affordable Care Act (ACA) health plans that were expanded under ARPA.
• Continuing funding to states for home and community-based long-term care services that were expanded under ARPA.
• Creation of a new “work-around” health insurance program for low-income people who live in the 12 states that have not yet expanded Medicaid under the ACA and consequently remain unnecessarily uninsured. (New York is not in this category.)
• Making funding for the State Child Health Insurance Program permanent.
• Providing funding to states to address disparities in maternal-child health morbidity and mortality.

We urge you to reach out our two US Senators from New York, Charles Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand about these issues. Both are supportive of all of them, and are pushing to bring them to fruition. They deserve our thanks, and encouragement to keep working for a final deal. Here’s how to contact them:

• Sen. Schumer – by email;  by phone
• Sen. Gillibrand – by email; by phone

Please also contact them on social media.

One additional and important note: As you contact both our Senators, it is important to stress that final deals are needed this month. Given the congressional calendar for this year and the impending mid-term elections this fall, it is vital that progress be made on these issues as quickly as possible, before the July 4^th recess week. After then, it will be very challenging to make progress on them.

Finally, it’s also helpful to check-in with your U.S. Representative to thank them for what they’ve already done, and to encourage them to keep working with the Senate to get these additional bills completed. Here’s how to get in touch with them.

Only two weeks and six session days left to go! That’s it for getting some good health care stuff done before the New York State Legislature adjourns for this year in early June. Here’s one more set of bills being put forward with regard to reproductive health care rights.

Earlier this month, a draft opinion in the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization case now before the US Supreme Court was leaked to the media. Its content signaled that the Court is poised to negate a constitutional right to abortion affirmed in their 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling. A final, official decision is due out by the end of next month.  

Since this leak, some state governments –including New York– are moving to enact laws to protect this and other rights that are threatened by the language of the draft. The good news is that three years ago, New York codified the rights affirmed by Roe v. Wade into state law.  
However, there’s more that can be done, and here’s what’s emerging in the State Legislature:

Equality Amendment (S.9707, Krueger) — An amendment to Article 1 of the State Constitution to a) assure that that equal rights may not be denied on account of race, color, ethnicity, national origin, disability, and sex including pregnancy and pregnancy outcomes, sexual orientation, gender identity, and gender expression, b) bar discrimination in both intent and impact by government entities, as well as barring discrimination in both intent and impact by entities in the provision of public accommodations, employment, or personnel practices, and c) protect the validity of efforts to prevent or dismantle structural forms of inequality and discrimination on the basis of a protected characteristic.

Reproductive Freedom and Equity Fund Act (S.9078/A.10148, Cleare/Gonzalez-Rojas) —  A bill to create a grant program to ensure access to abortion care in the state by providing funding to abortion providers and non-profit organizations whose primary function is to facilitate access to abortion care, particularly for those traveling from another state.

Freedom from Interference with Reproductive and Endocrine Health Advocacy and Travel Exercise (“FIRE HATE”) Act (S.9039/A.10094, Biaggi/Burdick) – This bill establishes a cause of action for unlawful interference with protected rights, to protect the rights of individuals seeking abortion care or gender-affirming care in New York.

Protection for Abortion Providers (S.9070A/A.9678A, Kaplan/Rosenthal) – A bill to Prohibit professional misconduct charges against health care practitioners on the basis that such health care practitioner, acting within their scope of practice, performed, recommended or provided reproductive health care services for a patient who resides in a state wherein such reproductive health services are illegal.

Role of New York Law Enforcement (S.8778/A.9615, Krueger/Lavine) – A bill to prohibit law enforcement from cooperating with out-of-state investigations related to the provision of lawful abortions.

Role of New York Courts (S.8779/A.9613, Krueger/Lavine) — A bill to prohibit New York courts and county clerks from issuing subpoenas in connection with out-of-state abortion proceedings.

It’s possible that several of these bills will be combined into a package to be considered as a whole. The legislative process with regard to them is fluid, so we urge people to be in contact with local reproductive rights advocacy groups to stay informed about developments and advocacy efforts.

Only six session days left to go! That’s it for getting some good health care stuff done before the New York State Legislature adjourns for this year in early June. Here’s one more set of bills being put forward to help more (if not all) New Yorkers get guaranteed health care:

Bills to Expand Insurance Coverage:

Continuous Medicaid for Infants and Toddlers (S.8438/A.9294, Rivera/Gottfried) – This bill will automatically extend Medicaid coverage to all eligible young children through the first three years of life. Currently, such coverage ends after only one year, at which point their family must either recertify for Medicaid or shift to another form of insurance coverage. Research shows that the first 1,000 days of a child’s life are very important to their physical, mental, social, and emotional development, and having health coverage in place during that period significantly advances those goals. In the Senate, this bill has passed through the Health Committee and is now before the Finance Committee. In the Assembly, It has passed through the Health Committee and is now before the Ways and Means Committee.

Universal Health Care (New York Health Act, S.1572A/A.880A, Rivera/Gottfried) – This bill will create a publicly-funded, publicly-administered health insurance program covering all New York residents and workers. It is similar to Medicare-for-All bills in Congress. The bill is currently in Health Committee in the Senate, and has passed through both the Health and Codes Committees in the Assembly and is now is in the Ways and Means Committee.

The campaign in support of the first bill above is being jointly led by our colleagues in Medicaid and various child health and welfare advocacy groups. The Campaign for New York Health is leading advocacy efforts to advance the New York Health Act, and we sit on its Steering Committee.

At this point in the legislative process, for either of these bills to move to the floor in either chamber for a debate and vote, each chamber’s Rules Committee will have to call up the bill directly. Whether or not they do so is based on the wishes of the leadership and/or strong support within the majority party’s conference membership. Again, we urge you to contact your own legislators about them. Strong public support is necessary at this point.

It’s now just seven session days to go! That’s it for getting some good health care stuff done before the New York State Legislature adjourns for this year in early June. Here’s another set of bills poised to move ahead to passage:

Improving Hospital and Community Relations

For more than two decades under several governors, scores of hospitals across New York State have been allowed and urged to merge, downsize, or outright close as new large hospital systems have been created as part of regional restructuring to improve financial stability of individual facilities systems as these networks seek to expand market share.  As a result, local communities have had their health care system destabilized, and they are left with fewer services or none at all.  The current COVID-19 pandemic has revealed the drawbacks of consolidations and closures for all to see.  Again, a universal health care program with proper health planning would have prevented various adverse outcomes, and made sure that communities have access to the services they need, particularly during a public health crisis.

Absent that however, there are some steps that New York lawmakers are taking to begin to reassert a proper role for communities in what happens to their hospitals as our health care system consolidates. These bills include:

Local Input for Community Healthcare Act (S.3131A/A.2251A, Kavanaugh/Simon) – As crazy as it seems, under current New York law, when a hospital closes or dramatically downsizes core services, no government approval or advance notice is required, and a public hearing in the affected community is only required within 30 days AFTER it happens! This bill flips the dynamic around so that:

• Closure of facilities or key services must be announced in advance.
• The State Dept. of Health plays an active role in approving, overseeing, and managing a closure.
• The local affected community has meaningful opportunities for input into the process overseen by the State.

This bill also applies to closures of maternity units and emergency departments, as well as a full-out shut down. This bill has already passed through the Assembly, and has passed through all relevant committees in the Senate and is ready for a floor vote.

Improved Transparency of Available Services (S.5400/A.6334, Hinchey/Rozic) – Often when patients are seeking personally-sensitive services from hospital systems such as reproductive health care, end-of-life care, or gender-affirming care, they suddenly discover that it may not be available from their local facility because of non-medical, policy-based exclusions made by the facility’s operators. This bill helps patients navigate such situations by:

• Requiring hospitals to publish what services they choose to exclude.
• Requiring hospitals to comply with existing state and federal law as to what services they provide. in a manner that is non-discriminatory against particular classes of patients.
• Requiring insurers to make such information available about their provider networks prior to someone enrolling in one of their health plans.
• Requiring the State to research and publish a report on the statewide scope of this problem by facility and hospital network.

We urge you to contact your State Legislators to express your opinions about either of the above bills if you support them, since the clock is ticking.

A few years ago, Community Catalyst, a Boston-based health policy organization that works with state-based health advocacy coalitions, helped to form the Community Voices for Health System Accountability project here in New York, in partnership with Health Care for All New York and Medicaid Matters New York. Its purpose is to foster a better, more meaningful role for community residents, leaders, and advocates with regard to their local hospitals and health care facilities, and to strengthen New York’s oversight of these institutions. We have participated in this project since then.

Eight legislative session days to go! That’s it for getting some good health care stuff done before New York State lawmakers adjourn for this year in early June. Here’s one set of bills poised to move ahead to passage:

#EndPatientMedicalDebt:

In recent years, medical debt that simply cannot be paid off by patients has emerged as one of the top concerns for health care consumers, and politicians nationwide are starting to sit up and take notice. Of course, comprehensive solutions (such as universal health care!) are needed to fully resolve the problem, but unfortunately that approach will take more time to develop a head of political steam both in Congress and the State Legislature. In the meantime, there are some steps New York lawmakers are taking to help alleviate the crisis:

Ending Wage Garnishments and Liens on Primary Homes (S.6522/A.7363, Rivera/Gottfried) – All hospitals in New York are legally non-profit charities, yet a small handful of large, well-resourced hospital networks can and do sue patients for outstanding debt, despite the fact that the State provides hospitals with a total of more than $1 billion/year to compensate for indigent care. When a hospital successfully sues a patient, as part of the judgement they can ask the Court to place liens on property and garnish workers’ wages, a practice advocates consider cruel and counterproductive. This bill would prohibit such practices. The good news is that it has passed through both chambers and will soon be sent on to Governor Hochul for her consideration to sign or veto.

Regulating “Facility Fees” (S.2521A/A.3470B, Rivera/Gottfried) – These new charges are something that many hospitals and medical practices are now tacking onto patients’ bills as a “resort charge” for just walking in the door seeking care. (Yet another way to pad their bottom line by sticking it to patients.) Sometimes these fees can be quite substantial depending on the overall amount of a bill. This legislation would a) prevent health care providers from charging these fees for preventive care, and b) require them to notify patients in advance when one is to be charged so that it doesn’t come as a surprise later on. The bill has advanced out of all relevant Committees in both chambers, and is ready for a floor vote.

Modernizing and Standardizing Hospital Financial Assistance Programs (S.7625/A.8441, Rivera/Gottfried) – All hospitals in New York are required by law to offer financial assistance programs to lower-income patients in the form of discount prices for in-patient services, and installment plans to pay down bills over time. However, there is little uniformity in learning about and applying for them, so many patients who could qualify never sign-up and get stuck with sky-high bills instead. This legislation would a) make the financial assistance process transparent and uniform across all facilities, b) streamline the application process without requiring lots of red tape and paperwork, and c) raise the income eligibility level to conform with those of the federal Affordable Care Act. This bill has passed out of all relevant committees in the Senate and is ready for a floor vote, and is now before the Ways and Means Committee in the Assembly after having passed out of the Health Committee.

We urge you to contact your state legislators about these bills since the clock is ticking.

With funding from the New York State Health Foundation, Health Care for All New York, a statewide coalition we help to lead, has been spearheading this multi-year campaign on patient medical debt, and we are proud to be part of the core team for it. In recent years, our campaign has passed bills to:

• Lower the annual interest rate hospitals can charge (if they choose) on outstanding bills to from 9% to 2%.
• Lower the statute of limitation for lawsuits from 6 to 2 years.
• Expand New York’s Surprise Medical Bills Law to cover all emergency room services at in-network rates.

The New York State budget process has spilled over into this week (past its April 1^st deadline), and is due to wrap-up in the next couple of days. There are still some key health care issues on the table that need one final push, and we urge everyone to contact lawmakers about them.

Here are the outstanding health care issues advocates are supporting:

• Public health insurance eligibility for ALL low-income New Yorkers regardless of immigration status (“Coverage for All”)
• A living wage for health care workers who provide home and community-based long-term care (“Fair Pay for Home Care”)
• Standardizing Medicaid eligibility criteria so that low-income people on Medicare qualify for Medicaid just like everybody else (“Medicare-Medicaid Equality”)
• Fair distribution of Indigent Care Pool funds to only those hospitals deemed “Enhanced Safety Net Providers”, as required by federal law.
• Higher Medicaid rates for health care providers to restore cuts from previous years and provide a long-delayed raise in general.

Here’s how to contact key State leaders to express your opinion on one or more of the above:

• Governor Kathy Hochul: 518-474-8390
• Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins: 518-455-2585
• Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie: 518-455-3791

Some background on the State-of-Play:

Coverage for All – At the very last minute, Governor Hochul and her Division of the Budget have suddenly asserted that the cost of this provision is much higher than a reputable independent study from the Citizen’s Budget Commission and the Community Service Society of New York, yet she has provided no documentation to back up the claim. Unfortunately, many Albany observers note that Governor Hochul is not supportive of including all immigrants in various proposals to help lower-income people.

Fair Pay for Home Care – Governor Hochul and her Division of the Budget originally proposed that home care workers be provided with one-shot bonuses to attract and retain them as part of the long-term care workforce. The Legislature prefers instead to provide these workers with a permanent pay raise. New York’s current home care workforce is woefully inadequate, to the point where thousands of frail and disabled New Yorkers have been approved for such services but there is literally no one ready to provide the care because the salaries are too low to draw and keep people in the profession.

Medicare-Medicaid Equality – Over the past decade, all of New York’s public health insurance programs have significantly raised their income eligibility levels and eliminated asset tests as part of their applications. However, the State has yet to do either for low-income people on Medicare who need Medicaid to augment the services Medicare does not cover (vision, dental, hearing, and long-term care) that everybody else on Medicaid routinely receives.

Governor Hochul initially proposed that the State standardize Medicaid eligibility criteria for all low-income people across the board, and the Legislature agreed. However, suddenly the Elder Law attorney lobby has flexed its political muscle to sew doubt with Governor Hochul and some legislators about eliminating an asset test. One of the major lines of business of these lawyers has been to assist middle and upper-income people on Medicare to restructure their finances so that they can then qualify for Medicaid coverage while also sheltering their assets. However, most low-income people on Medicare cannot afford these legal services. and they are denied Medicaid eligibility until they spend-down any modest assets they may have, thereby forcing themselves into poverty first.

Safety Net Hospital Support — For many years now, almost all hospitals across New York have received funding from the State’s billion dollar Indigent Care Pool that reimburses hospitals for services provided to uninsured and Medicaid patients. However, federal law requires that federal funds received for that pool must only go to those hospitals that provide care to large numbers of these patients. These hospitals are collectively known as Safety Net Providers. Unfortunately, New York has yet to update its distribution formula because of resistance from politically-influential hospital systems that would likely lose this funding. Neither Governor Hochul nor the Legislature have put this idea on the table in this year’s budget process.

Higher Medicaid Rates for Providers – Generally speaking, while nothing is locked down in the budget negotiations until everything is locked down, Gov. Hochul’s proposals on this issue seem on solid ground and the Legislature is in full support. So barring anything unusual happening at the last minute, they seem likely to be included. In addition, the health care provider community is strongly in support and they are usually very influential on health care issues in Albany.

Some larger factors at play:

• At the very last minute, after the public hearings were over and the Legislature’s one-house budget bills were passed, Gov. Hochul suddenly proposed a $600 million subsidy for a new football stadium in Buffalo, and also demanded major criminal justice reforms that technically have nothing to do with the budget per se. Both these ideas have fostered confusion and division in the Legislature.
• Advocates are demanding increased transparency, accountability, and justification for the State’s various regional economic development projects that over the years have generally utterly failed to meet their objectives, and they were often just shoveling billions of dollars to politically-connected businesses and institutions. This funding can be put to much better use to grow our state’s economy by increasing spending on long-underfunded health and social programs that help everyday New Yorkers.
• While the State currently projects a revenue surplus for the new fiscal year (estimates range from $6 to $10 billion), Gov. Hochul want to take a significant portion of that and put it in the State’s “rainy-day” reserve fund. However, many health and human service advocates are saying that “it’s raining now” for many lower-income everyday New Yorkers, particularly in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and its accompanying economic recession that many communities have yet to emerge from.

One of the most exciting proposals on the table during the current state budget negotiations in Albany is “Coverage for All.”  It will open up New York’s special public insurance “Essential Plan” to all low-income New Yorkers regardless of their immigration status. This is nothing radical since we have long covered all children and adolescents in low-income families through Child Health Plus, and pregnant and post-partum women through Medicaid. If we’ve learned nothing from living through two years of pandemic, it’s crucial to make sure everyone is enrolled in health insurance in order to promote good public health.

As we head into the final week of budget negotiations, NOW is the time for ALL OF US to call our Governor Hochul and state legislators to make sure Coverage for All gets included in their final agreement.  The good news is that there’s strong support for it in both the State Senate and Assembly. However, so far Governor Hochul is not yet on board, so the Legislature must stand strong and fight for it.

We urge everyone to contact state lawmakers on this issue, by phone, email, and social media:

• Governor Hochul – 518-474-8390 (phone); online email form here; @GovKathyHochul (Twitter & Instagram); Facebook page here
• New York State Senators – Find contact info by Senator here
• New York State Assemblymembers – Find contact info by Assemblymember here

• Simple message to Governor Hochul: “Accept the Legislature’s Coverage for All proposal in the final budget deal.”
• Simple message to Legislators:  “Keep fighting for Coverage for All in the final budget deal.”

Several years ago, the Coverage for All campaign was established by Health Care for All New York to develop and push for proposals to provide health insurance to all immigrant New Yorkers, many of whom can have few public or private coverage options. We’re proud to be on its leadership team that is being led by the New York Immigration Coalition and Make the Road New York, and includes around 160 organizations. You can learn all about this campaign here.

About 1 million New Yorkers remain uninsured. Over 400,000 of them are immigrants who don’t qualify for public insurance programs or federal subsidies to purchase private coverage. Approximately 245,000 of them could become eligible for our Essential Plan if our state steps forward to do the right thing in this year’s budget. Other states like California and Illinois are already providing coverage to more immigrants, so it’s time for New York to join that esteemed club.

t’s that time of year again!   The 2022 New York State Legislative Session opened earlier this month with Gov. Kathy Hochul’s State of the State address where she laid out her broad policy and legislative goals, and there’s some very good stuff she’s put on the table (and some stuff missing.)  A couple of weeks ago, she released her proposed FY 2022-23 state budget, and there’s some very stuff in it (and some stuff missing.)

Now it’s time for all of us to all get up-to-speed and in motion!  Here’s a few upcoming events to help everyone prepare:

Thurs. Feb. 3, 1 to 4 p.m. – Health Care for All New York’s Online Annual Winter Meeting. The keynote speaker is Danielle Holahan, Executive Director of New York State of Health, plus there will be a special salute to the Campaign for Excluded Workers.Strategic campaigns to be discussed include 1) proposals to expand and improve public health insurance programs to more lower-income people, 2) helping uninsured people get enrolled in and use coverage they are eligible for, 3) increasing funding for safety net hospitals, 4) new rights and protections for patients with medical debt they cannot pay, and 5) improving a local community’s role in the oversight of their hospitals; RSVP and more info here.

Tues. Feb. 8, 9:30 a.m. – All-Day Online Public Hearing on Gov. Hochul’s Budget Proposals for Health Care and Medicaid; RSVPs and more info here; and watch live online here.

Fri. Feb. 11, 1:30 p.m. –Webinar for Advocates on Health Care Aspects of Gov. Hochul’s Budget Proposals; jointly sponsored by Campaign for NY Health, Coverage for All, Health Care for All NY, and Medicaid Matters NY; RSVPs and more info here,

The Legislature’s budget session concludes on March 31^st, so we’ve only got about 2 months to make sure we can get the best stuff possible in the budget. After that, we’ll be pivoting to several non-budgetary proposals to make sure they move forward before the end of this year’s legislative session in early June.

What Gov. Hochul is proposing in her budget for health care:

• Expanding eligibility for Medicaid coverage for more low-income people on Medicare.
• Expanding eligibility for Essential Plan coverage for more moderate-income people.
• Improving Child Health Plus coverage, and eliminating all nominal premiums for it for moderate-income families.
• Expanding Medicaid post-pregnancy coverage from 2 months up to a full year for all legal residents.
• Licensing and regulating Pharmacy Benefit Management companies.

What’s still missing for health care:

• Expanding Essential Plan coverage to all low-income immigrants.
• Including all immigrant women under the post-pregnancy Medicaid expansion (see above.)
• Directing Indigent Care Pool funding solely to safety net hospitals that serve large numbers of uninsured, low-income, and Medicaid patients.
• Repealing eligibility restrictions on Medicaid long-term care enacted in 2020 but not yet implemented.
• Raising salaries for Medicaid home and community-based long-term care workers to a living wage level, and making sure that they and their families will not arbitrarily be throw them off needed public programs for health care, food, housing, and utilities.
• Eliminating the arbitrary annual growth cap for Medicaid spending.

What about universal health care?  This issue is not being raised by either Gov. Hochul or our legislative champions in the context of the FY 2022-23 budget negotiations. Instead, it will come into play after April 1^st, so watch for future emails about that then.  In the meantime, as you speak to lawmakers, we urge everyone to continue to stress the imperative of moving toward a statewide universal health care program as quickly as possible. If the COVID-19 pandemic has shown us anything, it is that we cannot fully address the public health and health care needs of all New Yorkers without one.

We’re excited to invite all New York health care and social justice advocates and activists to our 2021 Health Care Justice Leadership Annual Gala! We’ll be gathering online to shine a spotlight on and salute some very worthy individuals and groups who’ve risen to the occasion in exemplary ways during 2021, and we want EVERYONE to join us!  Once again this year, people can join us at the end of the workday from the comfort of your own home or office (so that we can keep everyone safe) while we celebrate our honorees and hear words of wisdom from our keynote speaker.

Our honorees this year include:

• For governmental leadership, Rep. Hakeem Jeffries

Rep. Jeffries has served New York’s 8^th Congressional District, encompassing central and southeast Brooklyn neighborhoods since 2013. He is currently a member of the Budget and Judiciary Committees, and chairs the House Democratic Caucus. During the current 117^th Congress, he has led successful votes to provide pandemic relief, update and expand our social contract and safety net via the Build Back Better Act, advance tax fairness, and protect and improve democracy via the For the People Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act.

• For Trade Union Leadership, Barbara Bowen and Judy Sheridan Gonzalez

Barbara Bowen and Judy Sheridan-Gonzalez both stepped down in 2021 as the president of their respective unions, the Professional Staff Congress of the City University of New York, and the New York State Nurses Association. Both have been dynamic, visionary women labor leaders in our city and state. Both led their unions in new politically progressive directions and turned away from go-along-to-get-along approaches to people in power. Both understood the importance of working in partnership with community leaders and members to advance health care and social justice.

• For community leadership, NY-4 Health Care Action, and Mary Clark

NY-4 Health Care Action is a collaboration of activist groups in Nassau County who have joined forces to engage their local members of Congress and constituents in support of the Build Back Better Act and its health care provisions. Leader groups include Indivisible Nassau County, Long Island Activists, Long Island Progressive Coalition, Nassau County Democratic Socialists of America, NY Progressive Action Network, NYS Alliance for Retired Americans, and 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East.

Mary Clark has been the Southern Tier Regional Director for Citizen Action of New York since 1985, and has led their federal health care advocacy efforts for many years in coalition with many other groups. Since 2008, she has coordinated the Health Care for America Now campaign across New York State.

Keynote speaker: Hon. Mark Levine

Mark Levine has just started his tenure as Manhattan Borough President after serving 8 years on the New York City Council representing the 7th Council District, encompassing the Manhattan neighborhoods of Manhattan Valley, Morningside Heights, West Harlem, Hamilton Heights, and Sugar Hill. During his second term on the Council (2018-21), he chaired its Committee on Health. In that role, he often held both the Cuomo and DeBlasio administrations publicly accountable for their policies and actions with regard to the COVID-19 pandemic, something few other public officials were willing to do, and he often spoke out for the needs and concerns of the community and health care workers.

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Please make plans to join us online on Thursday evening January 27th from 5:00 to 6:30 p.m. We’ll miss seeing and greeting everyone in person again this year, but look forward to doing so again soon, hopefully next year. In the meantime, feel free to bring your own libations and nibbles to your at-home screen, and wear your best activist gear so that we can see the beautiful diversity of our movement!

How to attend our online 2021 Health Care Justice Leadership Annual Gala:

• FIRST, EVERYONE should RSVP here so that their name gets on the list to receive further information by email about how to join the event in real time.
• NEXT, Individuals should make your donation here. Our suggested contribution is $75/person, however any amount larger or smaller is welcome and appreciated. Once a donation is made, you will receive the online connection information for the event.
• Unions and organizations can submit their donations here once a specific commitment is made to us via email. Groups can support our Gala by joining the Host Committee, placing an announcement in the online Commemorative Journal, and/or reserving a package of tickets.  Each group will receive a number of complimentary tickets based on the type and amount of support, and they can be used by any leader, member, or staff.

We need to ask everyone to please be as generous as you can with your financial support for our Annual Gala this year. Because of the ongoing pandemic, we were not able to undertake our Annual Dues Campaign in the spring, so we now have to make up the difference. Fortunately, we had sufficient reserves on hand at the time to see us through the summer and fall, but now our resources are depleted and must be replenished for us to continue our important work in 2022.  

We have several efforts to advance health care justice and health care for all during 2022. First and foremost, in Congress we need to get the Build Back Better Act over the finish line, advance tax fairness, and defend and improve voting rights and democracy across the U.S. Here in New York, we are seeking to expand public health coverage to all low-income immigrants and pregnant women, expand Medicaid access and improve Medicare affordability for low-income seniors and people with disabilities, end patient medical debt, strengthen safety net hospitals, and improve community engagement in the oversight of hospitals and nursing homes. Your generous financial support will enable us to foster community and labor collaboration toward these goals and other issues that will arise over the course of the year.