Medicaid: Emerging Woke and Weaponized Nightmare
Medicaid: Emerging Woke and Weaponized Nightmare
The Center for Renewing America (CRA) has proposed significant reforms and funding reductions to the fraudulent and harmful Medicaid program. Aside from the fiscal impact which we discussed elsewhere, these changes are also vital for bringing an end to the left’s destructive “health equity” agenda.
Definition
Health Equity is a derivative of critical theory that infuses CRT and other radical ideologies into the medical field. Health equity adopts the woke framework that racism, sexism, transphobia, homophobia, bigotry, and other maladies are inherent to the health system. Thus, the health system must be radically rebuilt to achieve equal outcomes. This is the most destructive iteration of critical theory as the implementation, practice, and execution of “health equity” may very well come at the expense of people’s lives.
Wokeness and Weaponization in Medicaid
- Twenty-five states use their Medicaid program to pay for chemical castration via “hormone therapy,” and twenty-three states use their Medicaid program to pay for irreversible and mutilating genital surgery.1
- Medicaid’s benefits are tied to Section 1557 of Obamacare which prohibits discrimination based on sex. However, the Biden administration has proposed a new rule within Section 1557 of Obamacare which would make the exclusion of coverage for “gender-affirming care” discriminatory.2 The administration attempts to force all taxpayers to pay for genital mutilation and chemical castration.
- Sixteen states currently fund abortions through their state Medicaid programs, effectively using federal match rates to subsidize the killing of the unborn.3
- Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) finalized a rule in 2022 that requires workers in hospitals and health systems that participate in Medicaid to receive the COVID-19 vaccine. 4
- Racialization of treatment and care through “health equity” is well underway. Both Utah and Minnesota prioritized minorities and other “disadvantaged groups” to receive COVID drugs and treatments ahead of and while other Americans were dying at higher rates.5
- Medical schools—like the University of Minnesota—have created new curricula focused on implementing “health equity” into the future medical practices of its graduating students. The school has established an entire center focused on this goal called the “Center for Antiracism Research for Health Equity.”6
- Hospitals—like Boston’s Mass General Brigham—are infusing “health equity” into their care plans and operations. In the case of Mass General Brigham, the hospital launched a $40 million “health equity” campaign to “address structural racism” in specialty care to begin treating patients based on perceived racial victimization, including resolving “inequities” in admissions to cardiac care units.7
- It should be alarming to every American that CMS released a “Framework for Health Equity” in 2022 that realigns Medicaid toward “taking an integrated, action-oriented approach to advance health equity” among underserved or disadvantaged communities. This includes remedies for “systemic barriers” and “operationalizing policies and programs” in support of health equity.8
Conclusion
Federal health care programs—including Medicaid— are infused with a woke agenda that will soon ration care to Americans because they are simply not high enough on the far left’s intersectional victim chart. It is called ‘health equity,’ and it is now fully embedded in CMS and HHS and has made its way into our medical schools and hospital systems. The CRA budget is the corrective that will stop this madness.
Endnotes
1. The Kaiser Family Foundation (October 11, 2022). “Update on Medicaid Coverage of Gender-Affirming Care,” The Kaiser Family Foundation. https://www.kff.org/womens-health-policy/issue-brief/update-on-medicaid-coverage-of-gender-affirming-health-services/
2. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Office of Civil Rights, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (August 8, 2022). “Proposed Rule: Nondiscrimination in Health Programs and Activities,” U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2022/08/04/2022-16217/nondiscrimination-in-health-programs-and-activities
3. The Kaiser Family Foundation (May 1, 2022). “State Funding of Abortions Under Medicaid,” The Kaiser Family Foundation. https://www.kff.org/medicaid/state-indicator/abortion-under-medicaid/?currentTimeframe=0&sortModel=%7B%22colId%22:%22Location%22,%22sort%22:%22asc%22%7D
4. The American Hospital Association (April 6, 2022). “CMS Updates Guidance on COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate for Health Care Workers,” The American Hospital Association. https://www.aha.org/news/headline/2022-04-06-cms-updates-guidance-covid-19-vaccine-mandate-health-care-workers
5. Thies, B. and Lindquist, S. (October 31, 2022). “Race Medicine: ‘Health Equity’ Pushes Medical Care Toward Racial Preferences,” Breitbart. https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/10/31/race-medicine-health-equity-pushes-medical-care-toward-racial-preferences/
6. The University of Minnesota School of Public Health. https://carhe.umn.edu/
7. Lee McFarling, U. (August 25, 2022). “’So Much More to Do’: A Hospital System’s Campaign to Confront Racism—and Resistance to Change—Makes Early Strides,” Stat News. https://www.statnews.com/2022/08/25/mass-general-brigham-campaign-confront-racism-early-progress/
8. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (2022). “CMS Framework for Health Equity (2022-2032),” Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. https://www.cms.gov/files/document/cms-framework-health-equity-2022.pdf
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