Letters to the editor Sept. 8

Shattering health care

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and President Donald Trump are systematically shattering our health care system. 

The Trump administration is throwing more than 15 million people off their health insurance through a cut of over $1 trillion to Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Some politicians say health care cuts will only affect people who are ineligible or abusing the system. In Montana approximately 964,000 individuals have health insurance with 12% uninsured. Nearly 300,000 Montanans have their health insurance through Medicaid or the ACA and another 262,000 are covered through Medicare. This means 60% of Montana residents will be directly affected by federal reductions in health care funding and changes in administrative requirements. This cut will also result in closing services at many nursing homes, health centers and rural hospitals.  

Kennedy with Trump’s blessing is also destroying the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the world’s pre-eminent health agency that saves lives and protects people from health threats. He has replaced experts with unqualified individuals who share their dangerous and unscientific views on vaccinations.  

Kennedy and Trump have cancelled  at least $500 million of federal funds for mRNA vaccine development --the kind of vaccine that helped stop the Covid pandemic. Cutting mRNA development affects preparedness for future pandemics and squashes technology potentially capable of eradicating cancer, malaria, tuberculosis and influenza. They have fired thousands of health workers and defunded programs designed to protect us from cancer, heart attacks, strokes, lead poisoning and instead have focused on “quack” treatments while downplaying vaccines.  

My father told me harrowing stories about his little sister dying in 1918 of the Spanish flu. As a young child I felt momentous relief when my mom took me to the health department to get a polio shot.  No longer did I have night terrors about spending my life in an iron lung like those kids pictured in Life Magazine. I felt similar relief when receiving the Covid shot since over 1 million Americans had already died from the disease. 

Trump and Secretary Kennedy, with no medical credentials, are dragging us backward potentially infecting all of us, particularly our children with once eliminated dangerous diseases. This is not a Republican or Democratic issue. It is a life issue.

— Carol and John Santa, Kalispell