Cascadia deserves universal healthcare

Earlier this week, after Washington state opened enrollment in the Washington Health Plan Exchange, I logged in to my account to see how much my monthly premiums will go up if Congress fails to renew federal subsidies for Obamacare, which expire this year. The rate, with subsidies, will be the same as I paid this year: $281 per month. But if the "tax credits" aren't renewed, my monthly bill, I discovered, would climb to $806:

This is one of the things at stake in the federal government shutdown, which is now in its 24th day. Republicans have indicated they're willing to negotiate about renewal, but we're all still waiting. An estimated 80,000 Washington residents will likely drop their Obamacare insurance if the subsidies aren't renewed (including me) and some 35,000 Oregon residents will see their subsidies disappear.

The governors and legislators in Washington and Oregon knew this crisis was coming earlier this year and did nothing to protect the residents of Cascadia in the event subsidies aren't renewed. We can hope Congress comes to its senses – or we here in Cascadia we can do something else: create statewide universal health care systems.

Both Washington and Oregon have universal health care task forces working to recommend next steps toward government-funded health care for all residents in both states. Whole Washington is an organization pushing for universal health care in Washington and Health Care for All Oregon is working for a universal health care system in Oregon.

If the GOP fails to fund the subsidies, at the very least governors Tina Kotek and Bob Ferguson should each call special legislative sessions in their respective states to backfill the missing subsidies.

But in the next session, the legislatures should to do the work to create increased autonomy for Cascadia by creating a universal health care system independent from Obamacare, one that builds on each state's ACA, Medicaid, and Medicare systems.

72 countries worldwide provide their citizens with universal health care. It's time for us in Cascadia to stop pretending that the United States will eventually join the rest of the wealthiest nations in the world in guaranteeing health care to its residents. We can tax the immense wealth in our region and do the right thing.

As the Kaiser Family Foundation notes, Go Fund Me campaigns soliciting donations to pay for obscenely high medical bills are becoming more and more common in the United States. This is a moral failure. It's time for Cascadia to listen to the 75 percent of Oregon residents and 64 percent of Washington residents who support a single-payer system.

The creation of the West Coast Health alliance was a positive step forward on Cascadia's path toward health care autonomy. Now our leaders need to finish the job.

--Andrew Engelson