Bernie Sanders Quotes About Health Care
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The United States has got to join the rest of the industrialized world in making sure that working families of the middle class have benefits that they absolutely need. We are the only major country on Earth that does not guarantee health care to all people as a right. We are the only major country on Earth that does not provide paid family and medical leave. There are many countries around the world which make sure that public colleges and universities are tuition-free. In our country, it's becoming increasingly difficult to afford to go to college.
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I did work with John McCain. I did work with Jeff Miller over in the House. And we put together not the bill that I wanted, but probably the most comprehensive V.A. health care bill in the modern history of this country.
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Of course their [Cuba's] economy is terrible, but they have Health Care and education.
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It is a dictatorship. They did have a good health - do have a decent health care system and a decent educational system. A lot of people have left Cuba for better dreams, to fulfill their aspirations.
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Where America has got to move is not growth for the sake of growth, but it`s got to move to a society that provides a high quality of life for all of our people. In other words, if people have health care as a right, as do the people of every other major country, then there's less worry about growth. If people have educational opportunity and their kids can go to college and they have child care, then there's less worry about growth for the sake of growth.
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Every major country on earth, whether it's the U.K., whether it's France, whether it's Canada, has managed to provide healthcare to all people as a right and they are spending significantly less per capita on health care than we are. So I do not accept the belief that the United States of America can't do that.
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It's absurd we remain the only major country on earth not to guarantee health care to all people and paid family and medical leave.
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The American people in Congress have got to ask themselves a very simple question. Why are we the only major country on earth not to guarantee health care to all people as a right?
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We have to develop a strong economic message which says every American is entitled to health care through a national health care program. And we're not going to allow these large corporations to push through trade agreements which allow them to throw Americans out on the street and run to China.
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Hillary Clinton is on record supporting a doubling of community health centers in this country, which will mean that tens of millions of people - poor people - will have access to health care that do not have it today. Is that significant? It is very significant.
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If people envisage me in the Senate they might think of me as someone who would emulate Paul Wellstone, fighting for the issues he fought for. He was a good friend of mine. We'll be trying to do a couple of things. One is fighting for national health care. Another is fighting to raise the minimum wage to a living wage, and changing our trade policies.
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When the media worries about what Hillary’s hair looks like or what my hair looks like, that’s a real problem. We have millions of people who are struggling to keep their heads above water, who want to know what candidates can do to improve their lives, and the media will very often spend more time worrying about hair than the fact that we’re the only major country on earth that doesn’t guarantee health care to all people.
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You go to Scandinavia, and you will find that people have a much higher standard of living, in terms of education, health care and decent paying jobs.
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Bernie Sanders did not wake up last night with this great idea that we should guarantee health care to all people as a right. Actually, it exists in every other major country on earth. You don't know that, because the media has forgotten to tell you that. But it does exist. In Denmark, because of union negotiations, the minimum wage is about $20 an hour. In Germany, you go to college tuition-free. In Finland, they actually pay you to go to college. Now, you don't know that in America because CBS forgot to tell you. But that is the reality.
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I am on the Health Education Labor Committee. That committee wrote the Affordable Care Act. The idea I would dismantle health care in America while we're waiting to pass a Medicare for all is just not accurate.
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I do believe that in the future, not by dismantling what we have here - I helped write that bill - but by moving forward, rallying the American people, I do believe we should have health care for all.
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We are the only major country on earth that doesn't guarantee health care to all people as a right and yet we end up spending much more than they do, so I do believe that we have to move toward a Medicare for all, single-payer system.
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Given the fact that poverty is growing, more and more Americans are losing health insurance, health care costs are going up, the middle class is shrinking, the gap between the rich and the poor is growing wider. That speaks to the weakness of the opposition. People do not like George W. Bush. But I think it's fair to say that they are not flocking to the Democratic Party, or see the Democrats as a real alternative.
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Now, why would my supporters be supporting somebody who doesn't want to raise the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour, a starvation wage, doesn't want to do that. Why would anybody that supports me support a candidate like Trump who wants to throw millions and millions of people off of health insurance? We need to guarantee health care to all people as a right, not throw millions of people off health insurance as Trump wants to do.
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If the goal of health-care reform is to provide comprehensive, universal health care in a cost-effective way, the only honest approach is a single-payer approach.
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I am going to do my best to try to create a country in which children are not living in poverty, in which kids can go to college, in which old people have health care. Will I succeed? I can't guarantee you that, but I can tell you that from a human point of view it is better to show up than to give up.
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In my view, it is not a question of Trump having won the election, it's a question of Democrats having lost the election. Democrats need a strong progressive agenda which says to the working class of this country, we are going the stand and fight for you, we're going to raise the minimum wage, pay equity for women, we're going to rebuild the infrastructure, and we're going to guarantee health care to all people as a right. We're going to make public colleges and universities tuition-free.
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As a single-payer advocate, I believe that at the end of the day, if a state goes forward and passed an effective single-payer program, it will demonstrate that you can provide quality health care to every man, woman and child in a more cost-effective way.
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What democratic socialism is about is saying that it is immoral and wrong that the top one-tenth of 1 percent in this country own almost 90 percent - almost - own almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent. That it is wrong, today, in a rigged economy, that 57 percent of all new income is going to the top 1 percent. That when you look around the world, you see every other major country providing health care to all people as a right, except the United States.
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The American people must make a fundamental decision. Do we continue the 40-year decline of our middle class and the growing gap between the very rich and everyone else, or do we fight for a progressive economic agenda that creates jobs, raises wages, protects the environment and provides health care for all?
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The United States must join the rest of the industrialized world, guarantee health care to all people as a right.
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These are the same people who believe, in some cases, the federal government should not play any role in providing health care to our people or protecting the environment.
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All that I can say is that we are spending far more per capita than people in any other country, and our health care outcomes are in many cases worse in terms of life expectancy, infant mortality and so forth.
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Health care in America must be a right, not a privilege.
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I wanna end the international embarrassment of the United States of America being the only major country on earth that doesn't guarantee health care to all people as a right, not a privilege.
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