'It's life and death': Advocates fear dangers of any Medicaid cuts

Erin Gabriel for the last 15 years has relied on Medicaid to cover the costs of doctor’s appoints, medications, physical therapists and tests to help her daughter Abby navigate life with disabilities.

Abby is autistic and non-speaking and uses a wheelchair. Doctors are still learning more about a rare, progressive degenerative syndrome she battles. She has suffered seizures and hearing loss, her mother said.

If Congressional Republicans slash Medicaid in their quest to drastically cut federal spending, Gabriel and her daughter could lose the support they rely on to pay for medical bills, physical therapists and school aides.

Gabriel worries that Abby — a 15-year-old who loves Disney and Taylor Swift — would have nowhere to turn if she outlives her parents and the Medicaid benefits she relies on are on the chopping block. Without Medicaid, Gabriel said, Abby may not be able to afford nurses or care facilities.

“Any cuts to Medicaid will threaten not just Abby’s future, but everyone’s,” said Gabriel, who serves as the government affairs representative for the Pennsylvania Health Access Network.

She joined local, state and federal officials at the City-County Building in Downtown Pittsburgh on Friday to advocate for Medicaid, which serves more than three million Pennsylvanians.

Officials painted a bleak picture of the future of health care if Medicaid were to be axed.

Rural hospitals could close. Health care jobs could vanish. Millions could be cut off from access to doctors, medications and therapists. Seniors could find themselves unable to afford their nursing homes.

“Cuts to Medicaid will cause a humanitarian crisis in Pennsylvania,” Pennsylvania Rep. Dan Miller, D-Mount Lebanon, said.

The commonwealth could not fund the program on its own if the federal government would cut its funding, Miller said. He urged people to pressure Congressional Republicans to save a program that had long been viewed as too crucial to cut.

“Medicaid is an essential program,” Miller said. “It is life sustaining. It serves Democrats, Republicans and independents alike.”

Congresswoman Summer Lee, D-Swissvale, said she’s seen a major uptick in constituents calling to advocate for Medicaid in recent weeks. She heard from one constituent who wondered how she’d afford to keep her mother in a nursing home that can provide the constant care she needs if Medicaid were slashed. Another questioned how her family would pay for pricey cancer treatments for her daughter.

“If we don’t protect Medicaid, it will be catastrophic,” Lee said.

Medicaid, she said, pays for more than 60% of nursing home residents. Nearly one in three births in the nation are covered by Medicaid. It covers children, infants, parents, seniors and people with disabilities.

“These are real people,” Lee said. “These are real lives.”

Among those people is disability advocate Josie Badger. Sitting in a wheelchair, she said she and the thousands of other disabled people who rely on Medicaid throughout the region deserve the help Medicaid offers.

“We know the country was based on the idea that all should have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” she said. “But what happens when that pursuit is reliant on Medicaid?”

According to Pittsburgh Mayor Ed Gainey, more than 50,000 Pittsburghers rely on Medicaid. One in every six children rely on it to see their doctors, he said.

“This isn’t politics,” Pennsylvania Rep. Dan Frankel, D-Squirrel Hill, chair of the Pennsylvania House health committee, said. “It’s life and death.”

Congressman Chris Deluzio, D-Fox Chapel, lambasted Capitol Hill Republicans for what he deemed a “fiscally reckless” budget strategy that would gut core government services, exacerbate federal debt and offer tax breaks to the wealthy.

“They would pillage our government,” he said. “They would take away health care to funnel money to the richest people who ever walked planet earth.”