Biden-Harris Administration Wins Again for Rural Communities of Color
Today the Biden-Harris administration announced the results of the first Medicare drug price negotiations with drugmakers. The first ten drugs selected for negotiation will result in approximately $1.5 billion in out-of-pocket savings for older Americans in the first year alone.
The following is a statement by Annie Contractor, Policy Director at RuralProgress:
Today’s drug price negotiation announcement is a huge win for rural residents in the United States who are going to see the greatest proportional benefit from these cost savings. Rural Medicare beneficiaries with disabilities spend more out of pocket than do their urban counterparts, a fact that was established a decade ago. These burdens flow most heavily to Black, Brown, and Indigenous rural residents.
Rural seniors, the majority of rural folks accessing Medicare, often face these higher healthcare costs because of longer distances to reach care, a higher rate of chronic conditions, and higher premiums, copays, and deductibles resulting from fewer available providers and less competition among insurers. Each of these disparities is even more pronounced in rural communities of color, lending today’s victory directly to our friends in these small towns and rural places. And the chronic conditions endured at a higher rate in rural communities of color are precisely those treated by the first ten drugs negotiated.
Our neighbors are about to see significant relief to their pocketbooks based on the first ten drug price negotiations.
But this win doesn’t come without storm clouds hovering; big corporations, backed by conservatives, are already filing lawsuits to try to take these cost savings away from everyday rural folks just trying to get by.
We are celebrating this win for rural communities today, and are watching the Biden-Harris administration delivering for rural communities. We also stand vigilant to defend these wins against the corrupt interests that stand to peel back yet another freedom: the freedom to afford the healthcare you need.
RuralProgress is a nonpartisan national network of civic leaders working to maximize rural America’s potential from the creators of RuralOrganizing.org
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