Here are a few excerpts from a CounterPunch article, Improved Medicare For All Becoming Unstoppable by Kevin Zeese - Margaret Flowers
Medicare for all has had majority support in the United States for more than a decade. As more people become aware of the details, support is growing. An August 23rd poll, conducted by Reuters/Ipsos, found 70% of the public now supports Medicare for all. We see the potential for winning National Improved Medicare for All in the early 2020s if people continue to build the movement necessary to demand it.
The very best strategy to get a voter into a voting booth is to give them a reason that THEY personally care about for being there. 70% of the public wants Medicare For All. The Democratic Party can either work to obtain those votes, or tell those who care about this issue to go suck eggs.
This widespread support is occurring because health care is in a crisis in the United States that touches every family. A growing majority of doctors and medical students are urging Medicare for all because they are experiencing the negative impacts of a health insurance-dominated healthcare.
What does “in a crisis” mean? To me it means the house is literally on fire, it is a time for action. In a burning house, does one take time to contemplate the pros and cons of water versus foam at stopping a fire, the relative damage that each might do to one’s belongings, the best technique to get a water stain out of a piece of fabric? No. During a time of crisis, the top priority is to focus on the actions that will get one OUT of said crisis as quickly as possible.
Note that last sentence in the quote. We have reached a point where doctors themselves want Medicare For All. Doctors are increasingly unhappy at work, and believe that ““the doctor-patient relationship has been morphed into an insurance company-client relationship that imposes limitations upon the treatment doctors can provide to the insurance company’s members.”” Physicians who may have been attracted to the profession by the prospect of helping and healing people are working in an increasingly depersonalized environment where patients are required to change providers for reasons of job change, income change, and/or employer pricing decisions. In short, being a doctor today is just not as satisfying as it once used to be.
Now, majorities of voters in both major parties support Medicare for all. According to the new poll, support among Democrats is 84.5%, 4.8% percent do not know and only 10.7% oppose. It will be difficult to win the Democratic presidential nomination without supporting National Improved Medicare for All. Indeed, most of the serious contenders for the nomination are already co-sponsors of S 1804, the Medicare for All Act, in the Senate and two-thirds of Democrats in the House, are co-sponsors of HR 676, the gold standard bill called “The Expanded and Improved Medicare for all Act.” In many states, to win the Democratic nomination for US Senate or governor, as well as in many House districts, it is becoming essential for candidates to support National Improved Medicare for All.
I like the branding change, away from the plain “Medicare For All” to what I think is better wording: Improved Medicare For All, or National Improved Medicare For All. The goal is not to force some frozen version of today’s Medicare onto everyone. The goal is to take a program that most seniors love, fix the most glaring issues, and make the program more widely available to those who are desperately in need of it.
70% of the public wants Medicare For All. That seems like a pretty big number to me, just saying.