Politics

Obamacare Replacement Will Kill People, Warren Claims

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Offering no evidence to support her claims, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren said Republicans’ Obamacare replacement bill that passed the House Thursday will cause Americans to die.

“Families will go bankrupt. People will die,” the liberal senator warned in a series of tweets Thursday afternoon. The non-partisan Manhattan Institute fact-checked the claim that repealing Obamacare will kill Americans — a favorite accusation for many Democrats — and found it unsupported by evidence. (RELATED: Without Evidence, Maxine Waters Says Salacious Allegations About Trump In Russian Dossier Are True)

“The best statistical estimate for the number of lives saved each year by the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is zero,” wrote Oren Cass, a senior fellow at the institute. “Certainly, there are individuals who have benefited from various of its provisions. But attempts to claim broader effects on public health or thousands of lives saved rely upon extrapolation from past studies that focus on the value of private health insurance. The ACA, however, has expanded coverage through Medicaid, a public program that, according to several studies, has failed to improve health outcomes for recipients. In fact, public health trends since the implementation of the ACA have worsened, with 80,000 more deaths in 2015 than had mortality continued declining during 2014–15 at the rate achieved during 2000–2013.”

Nevertheless, Warren launched the same attack on Thursday, without providing any evidence to support her claims.

“Trumpcare isn’t a health care bill,” Warren said, attempting to tie President Trump to the bill. “A bill that destroys health care for millions to shovel cash to the rich isn’t a health care bill. This is the same cruel Trumpcare bill that [House Republicans] tried to pass weeks ago. Still strips coverage from millions [and] guts Medicaid.”

“This isn’t football. It’s not about scoring points,” she added. “[The American Health Care Act] will devastate Americans’ healthcare. Families will go bankrupt. People will die.”

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