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ashoup
In Fact Sheet, Research

Republican Premium Hikes Will Raise Health Care Costs for Everyone

Small Business Owners, Middle Class Families, And Rural Communities Will Be Among The Hardest Hit By Republican Premium Hikes

Republicans are raising health care costs for millions of Americans by taking away critical tax credits from working families. Countless families are one health care bill away from bankruptcy, but Republicans are planning to increase their health care costs even more. Republicans are doubling health care premiums for millions of families, which will result in an estimated 5 million Americans losing their coverage altogether. Under Republicans’ plan, families will pay up to 90 percent more for their health care, while billionaires and CEOs will get another huge tax break. Democrats are fighting to stop Republican premium hikes. As of January 2025, a record 24.2 million Americans are enrolled in quality, affordable coverage because of the tax credits passed by Democrats in Congress without a single Republican vote – more than twice as many people with insurance as when Trump held office. 

The bottom line: Americans cannot afford Republican premium hikes. Every family should be able to afford health coverage, regardless of their zip code or income. Because of Republicans, health insurance premium hikes will be announced this summer, and starting in January 2026, tens of millions of people who buy coverage on their own will see their premiums skyrockets and millions will become uninsured, including self-employed Americans, small business owners, people living in high-cost rural areas, farmers, people with pre-existing conditions, older adults, and more. Here are some of the groups who will be hit the hardest:

  1. Middle Class Families Will Pay Thousands More For Health Care. Thanks to Republicans, families of four making about $125,000 each year will lose the premium tax credits that made their health care affordable and be forced to pay an average of $18,300 each year in premiums, an increase of over $7,500 per year.
  2. Small Business Owners Will Lose Access To Affordable Health Care. Small business owners and sole proprietors often rely on ACA Marketplace plans for affordable, quality coverage. 82 percent of small business owners and self-employed workers enrolled in Marketplace coverage rely on premium tax credits to afford health care. Self-employed Americans make up nearly 4 in 10 of those who will lose affordable health care under GOP plans.
  3. Rural Americans Will Go Without Affordable Options. Premiums are known to be higher in rural counties than suburban and urban counties, making tax credits especially essential to rural Americans having affordable health care. The tax credits made it possible for 65 percent of uninsured rural Americans to have access to zero-dollar premium health plans, and more than 76 percent are able to find a plan for less than $50 a month. If Republicans have their way, the divide between rural and urban America will grow wider. Farm states will be especially hard hit: nearly all Marketplace enrollees in farm states receive a tax credit, which reduces their monthly premiums by an average of over $500, and many farmers stand to lose some or all of their tax credits if enhanced premiums are not extended. 
  4. Early Retirees Will Struggle To Afford Health Care. More than half of the adults who will lose premium tax credits under Republican plans are between the ages of 50 and 64, an age group that disproportionately experiences hiring discrimination and may have been forced into early retirement by economic conditions. Over 5 million Americans ages 55 to 64 enrolled in Marketplace coverage in 2024. Thanks to Republicans, premiums will increase by an average of $17,511 for a 60-year-old couple making $80,000 a year.
  5. Young People Will Go Without Health Insurance. Republicans are removing the tax credits that made it possible for 63 percent of uninsured young adults to have access to zero-dollar premium health coverage and more than 75 percent able to find a plan for less than $50 a month. By raising costs on young Americans, Republicans will force an estimated 2.8 million younger Americans out of their Marketplace coverage. 
  6. Uninsurance Rates Among People Of Color Will Skyrocket. Thanks to the enhanced premium tax credits, more than 65 percent of uninsured Black adults are eligible for zero-dollar premium plans and 75 percent are eligible for plans less than $50 a month. More than 68 percent of uninsured Latino adults are eligible for zero dollar premium plans and nearly 80 percent can access plans for less than $50 a month. Because of the Republican premium hike, the percentage of uninsured could return to the double digits for both groups.
ashoup
In Fact Sheet

FACT SHEET: Trump’s Crusade Against The ACA Continues With Renewed Attacks On The Law In His Second Term

Since its passage 15 years ago, the Affordable Care Act (ACA) has become the bedrock of American health care, with millions relying on its coverage and protections. But undoing the ACA and its protections for over 100 million people with pre-existing conditions has been one of Donald Trump’s core fixations since announcing his presidential campaign ten years ago. He spearheaded a failed attempt to repeal and replace the law in 2017, supported efforts to overturn it in court, and spent his first term working to undermine the ACA at every turn by ending outreach, limiting enrollment, and promoting plans circumventing the law. Now in his second term, Trump has picked up right where he left off in 2020, working overtime to revoke Biden-era executive protections, slash outreach, and limit enrollment once again. But he isn’t stopping there. This time, he is determined to target the law’s core features – including Medicaid expansion and free coverage for preventive services like vaccines – and is even working to gut the very agency that ensures the ACA is properly administered, implemented, and enforced. The Trump-led plan to gut health care will only take us backward and throw the entire health care system into chaos.

The Second Trump Administration’s First Executive Actions Have Targeted the ACA. The second Trump administration has relentlessly targeted the ACA’s consumer protections and health care coverage provisions that provide affordable care to millions of Americans. In January 2025, within days of retaking office, Trump revoked a Biden administration order that prioritized protecting and strengthening the Affordable Care Act by pushing federal agencies to extend enrollment periods and dedicate extra funding for the third-party Navigators that help people enroll in ACA insurance. Trump also revoked a Biden administration executive order that aimed to lower prescription drug costs for people on Medicaid – including those enrolled thanks to Medicaid expansion – by analyzing new payment models.

The Trump Administration Is Gutting ACA Enrollment Outreach. In February, the Trump administration officially cut nearly 90 percent of ACA Navigator funding, mirroring a similar move in 2017 that coincided with a dramatic reduction in ACA Marketplace enrollment throughout the first Trump administration. On March 1, the White House unilaterally designated English as the official language of the U.S., rescinding requirements that government entities provide language assistance to individuals who do not speak English. Although the order does not direct agencies to change existing policies or programs, the action could limit outreach to consumers seeking health care with limited English proficiency.

The Trump Administration Is Working To Curb ACA Enrollment By Shorting The Enrollment Period, Imposing New Requirements, and Barring ‘Dreamers’ From Marketplaces. In March, the administration announced new rules designed to significantly curb enrollment by shortening the enrollment period, taking away low-income families’ ability to sign up for coverage outside of the six-week enrollment period, imposing more paperwork burdens for enrolling and proving eligibility for tax credits, and barring immigrants with ‘Dreamer’ status from enrolling in ACA Marketplace plans. In 2017, the Trump administration similarly halved the duration of Open Enrollment, reducing the period from three months to just 45 days.

The Trump Administration Is Slashing The Federal Workforce Overseeing Open Enrollment. Trump and Elon Musk are working to cut the bureaucratic apparatus that ensures that the ACA continues to be enforced and implemented without interruption. They fired around 1,900 probationary workers from the Department of Health and Human Services, and the Trump administration hinted they could fire as many as 5,200.

The Trump Administration Endorsed Plans To Cut ACA Medicaid Expansion Funding. In February, President Trump endorsed a budget resolution later passed by House Republicans that included budget cuts of nearly $1 trillion – a threshold that would require cuts to Medicaid. One of the proposed cuts includes reducing the federal match rate for Medicaid expansion under the ACA, which would force states to spend more than 25 percent more to foot the bill to the tune of nearly $50 billion. Reducing the federal match rate would threaten state budgets and would even end Medicaid expansion automatically in states with “trigger laws” designed to rescind Medicaid expansion if the federal match rate drops below a certain level.

The Trump Administration Is Targeting Services Covered Under the ACA. The Trump administration is undermining preventive services covered through the ACA by postponing the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) meeting – which offers guidance on vaccine approvals and influences which shots insurers are required to cover under the ACA. Additionally, new rules introduced by the Trump administration in March include a ban on ACA Marketplace insurers covering gender-affirming care as an essential health benefit.

ashoup
In News, Research

GREED WATCH: As Trump Conspires With Drugmakers to Raise Costs on Americans, Records Show Massive 2024 Earnings

Drugmakers Raked in $610 Billion in 2024, Spent $90 Billion Rewarding Shareholders, And Sued The Government To Rip Off Seniors For Even More Profit

View the Report as a PDF Here.

Later today, just months after treating them to dinner at Mar-a-Lago, Trump is scheduled to meet with chief executives representing big drug companies – including the head of top lobbying group Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA), which is still fighting in court to ban Medicare from negotiating drug prices and hike costs for millions of seniors and families. At a time when drug companies are cutting checks to shareholders rather than making their products more affordable to patients, Republicans are looking out for these greedy corporations at the expense of Americans.

Not only does Donald Trump and Republicans in Congress want to ban Medicare from negotiating lower drug prices, but they are trying to increase costs for seniors and taxpayers, and line the pockets of big drug companies at a time when the majority of Americans believe Congress should make it a “top priority” to expand negotiations – not repeal them. 

BY THE NUMBERS

  • We followed the 2024 earnings reports of 13 publicly-traded drug companies that have reported 2024 results and have drugs selected for negotiation in round 1 or round 2.
  • These 13 companies reported $610 billion in total global revenue and have announced dividend payments and stock buybacks totaling $90 billion.
  • The ten publicly held companies currently suing to ban Medicare from negotiating lower drug prices reported $480 billion in revenue. Those same companies reported shareholder compensation in the form of stock buybacks and dividends totaling $67 billion.

In 2024, 13 drug companies with products selected for price negotiation by Medicare reported $610 billion in earnings, a figure that is higher than the gross domestic product (GDP) of 88 percent of the countries in the world. This eye-popping revenue reflects the record-high prices drug companies set for drugs they launched in 2024, and overall prices that are three times higher for U.S. patients than for patients in other high-income countries. 

For too long, drug companies have been allowed to charge whatever they want, gouging patients to the point that 1 in 3 Americans report cutting pills or skipping doses because they can’t afford their medication. Fortunately, Democrats passed a law to lower drug costs for people on Medicare, including by finally allowing Medicare to negotiate lower drug prices on behalf of patients. 

Research establishes that pharmaceutical manufacturers could lose $1 trillion in revenue over a decade and still be the most profitable industry, yet big drug companies claim the new Medicare drug price negotiation program threatens their ability to invest in bringing innovative drugs to market. However, in the years following the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act, drug companies increased investment in bringing new drugs to market through higher spending on research and development. While drug companies increased their research and development budgets, they also rewarded their shareholders handsomely. Amgen, NovoNordisk, Novartis, and Teva spent more lining the pockets of shareholders than on their research and development budgets. 

Table 1: 2024 Big Drug Company Earnings and Spending

Spotlight on Medicare Negotiation: Drug Companies Suing to Block Medicare from Negotiating Lower Prices Reported Over $480 Billion in Revenue and Spent $67 Billion on Shareholders

In 2024, the ten publicly held companies that are currently suing (either directly, through a subsidiary, or through a trade organization) to ban Medicare from negotiating lower drug prices reported over $480 billion dollars in revenue. Those same companies reported shareholder compensation in the form of stock buybacks and dividends totaling $67 billion – more than the economies of Monaco, Iceland, and Albania combined. 

  • Novartis, the manufacturer of Entresto, reported $50.3 billion in revenue and spent $15.9 billion on shareholder compensation. 
  • Johnson and Johnson, which manufactures three of the ten drugs with lower prices being negotiated – Xarelto, Stelara, and Imbruvica – made $88.8 billion in revenue and spent $14.2 billion on shareholder compensation.
  • Novo Nordisk, the manufacturer of Ozempic/Wegovy/Rybelsus and Fiasp/NovoLog, far exceeded even their earnings expectations, bringing in $40.5 billion and spending $9.9 billion on shareholder compensation. 
  • Eli Lilly, which manufactures Jardiance and Tradjenta, made $45 billion in revenue and spent $7.4 billion on stock buybacks and dividends for shareholders.
  • AstraZeneca, the manufacturer of Calquence and Farxiga, raked in $54.1 billion in revenue and spent $4.6 billion on shareholder compensation. 
  • GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), which manufactures Trelegy Ellipta and Breo Ellipta, reported $39.4 billion in revenue and spent $3 billion on stock buybacks. 
  • Amgen, which manufactures Otezla and Enbrel, reported $33.4 billion in revenue while spending $5 billion on investors. 
  • Bristol Myers Squibb, which manufactures Pomalyst and Eliquis, raked in $48.3 billion and spent $4.9 billion on shareholder compensation.
  • Teva, the manufacturer of Austedo, reported $16.5 billion in revenue and spent $1.4 billion on stock buybacks and dividends. 
ashoup
In News, Report, Research

NEW REPORT: The Republican War on Health Care: Medicaid Cuts for Millions, Tax Cuts for the Ultra-Wealthy

Protect Our Care Releases New Report Detailing the Republican War on Health Care Threatening More Than 70 Million Americans Who Depend on Medicaid

Read the Report Here

Washington, DC – Today, Protect Our Care is releasing a new report detailing how Republicans are trying to gut Medicaid in order to pay for tax cuts for the ultra-wealthy and big corporations. In recent weeks, Republican lawmakers have reignited their call for cuts to Medicaid, which would have a devastating impact on millions of families across the nation. 

Medicaid is the largest health insurance program in the country, providing health care to more than 70 million Americans. Cuts to the program would mean ripping away health care from millions of families who count on it, including kids, moms, seniors, people of color, rural Americans, workers whose employers don’t provide health insurance, and people with disabilities. The consequences of any cuts to Medicaid would touch nearly every household in America.

“Republicans are reigniting their war on health care by putting Medicaid on the chopping block in order to fund more tax breaks for the ultra-wealthy and big corporations,” said Protect Our Care Chair Leslie Dach. “Medicaid is an essential pillar of our health care system that covers more than 70 million Americans, but Republicans are hellbent on pushing through their extreme and out-of-touch agenda that would rip away health care from millions of families who count on it. We’ve seen these threats from Trump and his allies in Congress before, and we must do whatever it takes to stand up to these dangerous attacks on our health care system that would devastate millions of families across the country.”

Protect Our Care has launched a multi-million dollar “Hands Off Medicaid” campaign to sound the alarm on Republicans working to slash Medicaid funding to pay for another round of tax cuts for the wealthy and big corporations. The campaign will feature every possible tactic to block any effort to slash this vital health care program, including paid advertising, advocacy and earned media activities, and more.

By The Numbers

  • Republicans will create a $50 billion hole in state Medicaid budgets to pay for tax breaks for the wealthy and corporations. 
  • If Republicans decrease federal funding for people in the Medicaid expansion population, it would immediately rip health care away from 4 million Americans across twelve states and jeopardize health care for about 21 million people.
  • Republicans threaten care for 18.5 million people on Medicaid by imposing lifetime caps.
  • Republicans could deny coverage to 36 million Americans through burdensome bureaucratic reporting requirements.
ashoup
In News, Fact Sheet, Research

Fact Sheet: RFK Jr. Spread Conspiracy That Lyme Disease Came From a Military Bioweapon

In recent weeks, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has been on a whirlwind tour attempting to convince the public and the Senate that he is right for the job of Secretary of Health & Human Services. However, Kennedy’s embrace of nutty medical misinformation and conspiracy theories, combined with his empty resumé, makes it clear that he is utterly unqualified to run HHS and would be an unmitigated disaster for American health care. 

One of his lesser-known conspiracy theories involves a wildly outlandish set of beliefs surrounding Lyme disease. He has claimed that the tick-borne illness is a military bioweapon and blamed vaccine research for creating the disease. There is still no vaccine for Lyme disease, in part due to the same misinformation pushed by Kennedy about vaccines supposedly causing the illness. Lyme disease is a serious illness with cases primarily concentrated in New England that impacts nearly 500,000 people every year. The disease can lead to distressing and even disabling symptoms in 10 to 20 percent of cases, and reportedly has an annual cost of diagnosis and treatment totalling almost $1 billion. Kennedy’s bizarre stances about a serious disease that impacts thousands of Americans annually demonstrate the real threat he poses to public health.

Kennedy Spread A Conspiracy Theory Claiming That It Was “Highly Likely” That Lyme Disease Was A Military Bioweapon. During an episode of his podcast discussing Lyme disease, Kennedy launched into a tirade about the disease supposedly being a bioweapon: “Another thing that keeps us from enjoying the outdoors and keeps us locked inside and the idea that this may have been, is highly likely to have been a military weapon, and we cannot say 100 percent for sure, but we do know that they were experimenting with tics there. The tics, as you show, are an epidemic because of what happened at Plum Island and the other labs. […] We also know that they were experimenting with diseases of the kind, like Lyme disease, at that lab, and they were putting them in tics and then infecting people. 

  • Kennedy’s Bioweapon Conspiracy Theory Has Been Discredited. The conspiracy theory that Lyme disease was supposedly created by the U.S. military as a bioweapon has been thoroughly debunked.  The American Lyme Disease Foundation wrote, “Some claim that Lyme disease was introduced into the northeastern region of the U.S. by a man-made strain of Borrelia burgdorferi that escaped from a high containment biological warfare laboratory on Plum Island. However, there is ample evidence to indicate that both Ixodes ticks and B. burgdorferi were present in the U.S. well before the Plum Island facility was ever established.” According to a Washington Post op-ed written by infectious disease professor Sam Telford, “It’s an old conspiracy theory enjoying a resurgence with lots of sensational headlines and tweets. Even Congress has ordered that the Pentagon must reveal whether it weaponized ticks. And it’s not true.”

RFK Jr. Blamed Vaccine Gain-Of-Function Research For The Creation Of Lyme Disease. As Rolling Stone reported, Kennedy convened a panel of health misinformation advocates in 2023, during which they discussed the origins of infectious disease and their relationship to vaccines: “At one point, he baselessly asserted that vaccine research had been responsible for the creation of some of the deadliest diseases in human history, including HIV, the Spanish flu, and Lyme disease.” Kennedy reportedly also promised he would “end all gain-of-function research…It’s just a disaster, it’s given us no benefits. It’s given us everything from Lyme disease to Covid, and many many other diseases. RSV, which is now one of the biggest killers of children, came out of a vaccine lab.” 

  • The Previous Lyme Disease Vaccine Was Pulled In Part Because Of The Same Type of Misinformation Spread By Kennedy. Dr. Robert Smith of MaineHealth said that the previous Lyme disease vaccination, which was on the market in the mid-90s, was removed from the market in part because of misinformation that the vaccine caused the very disease it was intended to cure. According to the Portland Press Herald, “There were a number of reasons the previous human vaccine was removed from the market, Smith said, including misinformation that the vaccine caused Lyme disease, and that the disease had not reached the high number of cases now being reported, especially in the Northeast. Knight said the new vaccine will likely be more effective than the previous one, which was only on the market for a few years starting in the late 1990s.”

KEY STATES

Maine Has Among Highest Rates of Lyme Disease and Is The Site Of Ongoing Vaccine Trials And A Lyme Disease Study. According to the CDC, Maine has some of the highest rates of Lyme disease in the nation. There were 2,544 cases reported in the state by October 2024, nearing the state annual record of 2,943 cases in 2023. Maine was also a key state in vaccine trials and a large study of the disease. MaineHealth has been helping test a new version of the Lyme disease vaccine after the previous one was pulled from the market in the mid-90s. The manufacturer of this new vaccine, Pfizer, reportedly chose Maine as its site for clinical trials due to the state’s high rate of Lyme disease: “Pfizer has partnered with a Maine health care system to conduct the third phase of a Lyme disease clinical trial to test the efficacy of the company’s vaccine. The trial, held at Northern Light Health system in Brewer, will span over 13 months and require patients to take two shots two months apart. In March, the patients will need to take a booster shot before the next summer’s tick season, The Bangor Daily News reported last week. […] Li said Pfizer approached the hospital system about the clinical trial because Maine has one of the highest rates of Lyme disease infections in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.”

Rhode Island Has The Highest Incidence Rate of Lyme Disease and Continues to Trend Upwards. Rhode Island has the highest incidence rate of Lyme disease in the country, with 212 cases per 100,000 in the state in 2022. The years of 2021 and 2022 marked a massive increase in reported Lyme disease diagnoses with 2,617 cases reported in 2021 and 2,904 cases in 2022. In 2023 that number fell slightly to 2,852 cases reported but now evidence has shown that 2024 may have been the largest jump in annual cases reported in the last decade. This past year a whopping 3,218 cases were reported, a nearly 13 percent increase in the span of only one year. Studies have shown that climate change and the warmer winters in Rhode Island has had a direct impact on the number of tick-borne illness reports. A supermajority of Americans support not only a vaccine for Lyme disease but also vaccinating their children against it; however, Republicans like RFK Jr. continue to promote conspiracy theories even as rarer tick-borne illnesses like Powassan virus are becoming more and more prevalent alongside Lyme disease diagnoses.

Connecticut is Where Lyme Disease was First Discovered and Remains the Leader in the Uphill Fight Against Both Anti-Vaxxers like RFK Jr. and the Disease Itself. Connecticut is in the top ten states when it comes to Lyme disease transmission. Between the years of 1985 and 2017, the Connecticut Department of Public Health (DPH) reported an average of 2,718 cases of Lyme disease annually with a high count of 4,631. This pales in comparison to new research coming from the CDC on underreporting problems, which suggests that potentially 10 times as many people in Connecticut, around 30,000, could be infected with Lyme disease annually. Recent studies have shown the tick population as well as the prevalence of tick-borne illnesses are on the rise in Connecticut, with climate change’s effects of shortening winters and longer summers playing a major role in this development. DPH has reported that 26.5 percent, more than one in four, of the ticks they’ve tested have come back positive for Lyme disease; on top of this there are now reports of “trifecta infections” from tick bites, with doctors seeing a massive increase in symptoms and diagnoses, including the first report of a human Rickettsia parkeri case. As anti-vaccine rhetoric and policy from Republicans like RFK Jr. continues to grow it is imperative to reject in order to continue and expand the fight against tick-borne illnesses.

Lyme Disease Is Skyrocketing In Massachusetts, With Over 5,000 Cases In 2022. Massachusetts is by far the most populous state in New England, with a high population density translating to a high risk for tick exposure in the state. Lyme disease cases in Massachusetts have been skyrocketing recently, with state health officials reporting over 5,000 cases in 2022. Though this rise was in part attributable to recent methodological changes and improved data collection, the new numbers reflect better disease surveillance in the state and paint a clear picture of the serious threat Lyme disease poses in Massachusetts.

New Hampshire Has A High Rate of Lyme Disease. New Hampshire has one of the highest rates of Lyme disease in the U.S., reporting 1,563 cases in 2021, an incidence rate of 112.5. The disease was rare until the past two decades, with less than 300 cases reported every year before 2006. Since then, the number of annual cases reported in New Hampshire has never dropped below 600.

Lyme Disease Rates Are Rising In Vermont As Ticks Spread North With Urban Development. Vermont has a high rate of Lyme disease, with an increasing rate of annual reported cases over the past 20 years. Tickborne illnesses were rare in the 1990s in Vermont, but as of 2019, Vermont’s 3-year average incidence rate for Lyme disease was the second-highest in the country. In 2022, 1,312 cases were reported. Around half of all ticks studied are pathogen-carrying in the state, and urban development in northern Vermont has reportedly expanded the tick population to new parts of the state.

ashoup
In News, Fact Sheet, Research

FACT SHEET: RFK Jr.’s Plans To Defund, Slash Jobs and Undermine the National Institutes of Health Would Be Disastrous For Americans

RFK Jr. Has Vowed to Fire and Prosecute Hundreds of NIH And FDA Employees and Pause All Research On Drug Development And Infectious Disease

It’s no secret Donald Trump’s nomination of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) poses a huge threat to the top health institutions that keep Americans safe and healthy. As HHS Secretary, RFK Jr. would prioritize his own interests over the needs of the American people. Not only does he oppose lifesaving vaccinations, but he has also downplayed the severity of infectious diseases and plans to gut funding for the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH), which will halt the progress of essential research on lifesaving drug and vaccine development. 

The NIH is among the top medical research centers in the world. On top of the lifesaving research conducted by NIH, the research center also serves as the impetus behind a significant portion of the economy, both in the private and public sectors. Funding from the NIH contributed to 99.4 percent of all drugs approved in the U.S. from 2010 to 2019. The 50 states receive tens of billions in funding from NIH awards annually, and the research center supports nearly half a million jobs and hundreds of billions of dollars in economic activity in the states. 

RFK Jr. has absolutely no place leading our health care system. Working families deserve access to affordable, high-quality health care and an HHS leader who trusts science and is committed to strengthening public health, not tearing it down.

BY THE NUMBERS

  • Researchers across the country received $37.81 billion in NIH awards in FY2023.
  • $92.89 billion in state economic activity is supported by NIH funding, reflecting a 2.46x return on investment.
  • NIH grants directly support 412,041 American jobs. Nearly 2.3 million Americans are employed by around 150,000 businesses in the American bioscience industry.
  • Thousands of top universities, hospitals, research institutes, and biopharmaceutical companies are supported by NIH funding.

The NIH Funds Critical, Lifesaving Drug Research. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) contributes billions to critical drug research and development throughout the U.S. A study of 356 drugs approved by the FDA between 2010 and 2019 found that the NIH contributed funding to all but two of the drugs – 99.4 percent of the drugs included in the study, and every single new drug approved between 2010 and 2016, with funding totaling $187 billion. The study also found that spending from the NIH on drug research and development was not less than industry spending, demonstrating the vast scale and influence of the NIH in the pharmaceutical industry.

The NIH Is A Key Source of Economic Activity. Beyond prescription drug research, NIH funding is a massive generator of economic activity in the U.S. In FY2023 alone, researchers across the country were awarded $37.81 billion in NIH grants. In turn, $92.89 billion in state economic activity is supported by NIH funding – reflecting a 2.46x return on investment, or $2.46 in economic activity generated for every dollar awarded by the NIH. The NIH directly funds 412,041 American jobs, and nearly 2.3 million Americans are employed by around 150,000 businesses in the American bioscience industry overall. In addition, thousands of top universities, hospitals, research institutes, and biopharmaceutical companies are supported by NIH funding.

Kennedy Says He Will Pause All Research On Drug Development And Infectious Disease. At a June 2024 town hall meeting Kennedy said, “I’m going to go to NIH my first week and I’m going to call all the division heads and I’m going to call all the bureau chiefs and I’m going to say, we’re going to give drug development and infectious disease a break. A little break, a little bit of a break for about eight years.” These remarks echo what he told an anti-vaccine conference in November 2023, when he said, “I’m gonna say to NIH scientists, God bless you all. Thank you for [your] public service. We’re going to give infectious disease a break for about eight years.” Kennedy has also claimed that he will go after medical journals and redirect funding away from epidemiology, a practice that seeks to prevent and control the spread of disease. 

Kennedy Has Vowed to Fire and Prosecute Hundreds of NIH And FDA Employees. Kennedy claims to have a list of 600 employees of the NIH that he plans to fire on day one. Before the 2024 election, Kennedy posted on social media, “FDA’s war on public health is about to end. This includes its aggressive suppression of psychedelics, peptides, stem cells, raw milk, hyperbaric therapies, chelating compounds, ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine, vitamins, clean foods, sunshine, exercise, nutraceuticals and anything else that advances human health and can’t be patented by Pharma. If you work for the FDA and are part of this corrupt system, I have two messages for you: 1. Preserve your records, and 2. Pack your bags.” During a “Make America Healthy Again” event in October 2024, Kennedy also said he would fire every nutritional scientist at the FDA “on day 1,” claiming he would otherwise “ship them to a new HHS headquarters in Guam” if unable to fire them. Kennedy has threatened to prosecute Dr. Anthony Fauci and he claimed that he would eliminate “entire departments” and hundreds of employees at the FDA.

Kennedy: “I Do Not Believe That Infectious Disease Is An Enormous Threat To Human Health.” At a 2023 roundtable, Kennedy said he does “not believe that infectious disease is an enormous threat to human health.” Kennedy also claimed that “medical research on these diseases and vaccine research has created some of the worst plagues in our history” and baselessly asserted that vaccine research was responsible for the creation of HIV, the Spanish flu, Lyme, and RSV.

ashoup
In News, Report, Research

NEW REPORT: Misinformation Kills: RFK Jr’s Deadly Visit To Samoa

Foreword by Hawaii Governor Josh Green

Read the Report Here.

Washington, D.C. — Today, Protect Our Care is releasing a new national report with a foreword from Hawaii Governor Josh Green. The report details Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s role in the deadly measles outbreak in Samoa and the danger he poses to the health and well-being of millions of Americans if confirmed as the next Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). In 2019, RFK Jr. visited the island nation of Samoa to spread anti-vaccination conspiracy theories, which led to the deaths of 83 people, primarily infants and children. To this day, he refuses to take responsibility and continues to oppose lifesaving vaccines, saying he “does not believe that infectious disease is an enormous threat to human health.”

RFK Jr. is unqualified and holds dangerous anti-science and anti-vaccination policy positions, ready to put his personal interests ahead of the health and safety of the American people. Under his leadership, more people will get sick and die – especially children. 

“As a firsthand witness of the tragedy in Samoa, I am certain that the nomination of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. would be devastating for the health of the American people,” said Hawaii Governor Josh Green. “Vaccine misinformation is deadly, period. For years, Kennedy has fueled misinformation and conspiracy theories about vaccinations and other public health measures that keep people safe. He is unfit to lead our nation’s health care system.”

“What RFK Jr. did to Samoa he will do to America. RFK Jr. poses a life-or-death threat to millions of Americans if confirmed as HHS Secretary,” said Protect Our Care Chair Leslie Dach. “RFK Jr. has said that ‘no vaccine is safe and effective.’ His opposition to vaccines will lead to a resurgence of deadly childhood diseases like polio and measles. He supports defunding lifesaving research that is used to develop treatments and cures for diseases. RFK Jr. rejects proven science that keeps people healthy and if he is put in a position like HHS secretary, the damage would be catastrophic.”

Timeline of Events:

2018

  • Two children in Samoa died after receiving their MMR vaccine as a result of nurses improperly mixing the vaccines with a liquid muscle relaxant instead of water. The nurses were sentenced to five years in prison for manslaughter.
  • RFK Jr’s Children’s Health Defense posted on Facebook questioning the safety of measles vaccines.
  • The World Health Organization estimated that in 2018, only 31 percent of infants in Samoa received the measles vaccine, a drop from 60 to 70 percent in previous years.
  • RFK Jr’s Children’s Health Defense never updated the public about the true cause of the babies’ deaths.

2019

  • While vaccination rates were dropping, Kennedy traveled to Samoa in June 2019, meeting with the Prime Minister and other government officials. The trip had been arranged by a prominent Samoan anti-vaccine activist, and paid for by Children’s Health Defense. RFK Jr. appeared with government officials and local anti-vaccine activists.
  • The measles outbreak began in September 2019.
  • A state of emergency was declared in November 2019, closing all schools, keeping children under 17 away from public events, and mandating vaccines.
  • The anti-vaccine activists with ties to Kennedy used misinformation and harsh rhetoric to oppose the government’s efforts in containing the outbreak.
  • By January 22, 2020, 5,707 measles cases and 83 measles-related deaths were reported. 87 percent of the reported deaths were children younger than 5 years.
ashoup
In News, Fact Sheet, Research

FACT SHEET: Five Ways Republicans Are Planning To Gut Medicaid

The GOP war on Medicaid is alive and well. Republicans are targeting Medicaid for deep budget cuts as part of a reconciliation bill coming early next year in order to fund tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans. Medicaid is an essential pillar of our health care system. It is the largest health insurance program in the country, providing health care to more than 70 million Americans — nearly a quarter of the country. Medicaid is jointly funded by the federal government and the states, and it is supported by 76 percent of Americans. It covers one in five Americans, including kids, moms, seniors, people of color, rural Americans, and people with disabilities. 

Five key ways Republicans could cut federal Medicaid funding and leave millions of Americans uninsured and unable to afford health care include: imposing lifetime caps on coverage, slashing the federal matching rate for traditional Medicaid and Medicaid expansion, implementing bureaucratic reporting requirements, block granting Medicaid, and introducing per capita caps. All of these policies mean that millions would lose their coverage, state budgets would be strained, and rural hospitals would be more likely to close. Every family knows someone who counts on Medicaid. If MAGA Republicans get their way, Medicaid will be decimated — taking health care away from hardworking families across the country all to pay for more tax breaks for the wealthy. 

By The Numbers

  • Republican threats to Medicaid put health care at risk for 72 million (21 percent) of Americans including:
  • Republicans will create at least a $50 billion hole in state Medicaid budgets to pay for tax breaks for the wealthy and corporations. 
  • If Republicans decrease federal funding for people in the Medicaid expansion population, it would immediately rip health care away from over 4.2 million Americans across 12 states and jeopardize health care for about 21 million people.
  • Republicans threaten care for 18.5 million people on Medicaid by imposing lifetime caps.
  • Republicans could deny coverage to 36 million Americans through burdensome bureaucratic reporting requirements.

Five Ways The GOP Plans To Gut Medicaid

  1. The GOP Will Impose Lifetime Caps For People On Medicaid. Republicans want to enact the Project 2025 playbook by imposing lifetime caps for people on Medicaid. Proposals have suggested people remain eligible for just 36 months, potentially over their entire lifetime. If enacted, the Center For American Progress found that these caps would strip benefits from hardworking families and people with complex medical conditions, particularly in states that have not expanded Medicaid, endangering coverage for the 18.5 million people with Medicaid who qualify based on income alone.
  2. Republicans Want To Slash Federal Funding for Medicaid By Reducing the Amount of Federal Funding That Matches State Medicaid Funding. As part of their plans to slash spending, Republicans could achieve their longtime goal of eliminating federal funding for Medicaid expansion and decreasing funding for traditional Medicaid. The Affordable Care Act provided for states to expand Medicaid eligibility by offering matching federal funds as an incentive. Some recent proposals have suggested lowering the federal match rate to 90 percent or lower, which would create a $50 billion hole in state Medicaid budgets. Research shows Medicaid expansion improves people’s health, keeps hospitals open, increases families’ financial security, and saves lives – and, in turn, helps reduce racial and ethnic, rural, and other health disparities. As of 2024, 41 states (including DC) have expanded Medicaid under the ACA. However, 12 of these states – Arizona, Arkansas, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Montana, North Carolina, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Virginia, and Utah – have a trigger law, which means that health care will be at risk or immediately be ripped away from 4,291,000 people across the country if the GOP succeeds in gutting funding for Medicaid expansion.
  3. Republicans Want To Impose Burdensome Bureaucratic Reporting Requirements. Several recent Republican budget proposals have included plans to introduce bureaucratic work reporting requirements as a mandatory part of Medicaid enrollment and verification. By imposing work reporting requirements, Republicans are only seeking to cut Medicaid and kick millions of people off the rolls. Research shows that work reporting requirements cost states money and do not improve people’s ability to find work. In Georgia, a GOP alternative to Medicaid expansion emphasizing work requirements cost taxpayers $26 million, only provided coverage to 3,500 people, and resulted in consulting firms pocketing 90 percent of the funding. If Republicans succeed in implementing work reporting requirements, up to 21 million Americans could be denied Medicaid coverage.
  4. Republicans Want To Radically Restructure Medicaid Through Block Grants, Resulting In Deep Cuts. Another way MAGA Republicans want to radically restructure Medicaid is by changing it into five block grants. In March, the Republican Study Committee released a proposal to do just that. Block grants would shift costs to states and inevitably result in deep cuts to Medicaid programs by capping the amount of federal Medicaid funding states receive. As CBPP found in 2017, a block grant would force states to make deep cuts to their Medicaid programs to compensate for the federal funding cuts. Currently, the federal government pays between 50 percent and 77 percent of enrollees’ Medicaid costs, and more for certain high-value services. Republicans’ proposals to slash billions in federal funding from Medicaid would strain state budgets and leave tens of millions of people uninsured.
  5. Republicans Want To Introduce Per Capita Caps For Medicaid, Shifting Costs To States. Past Republican budget proposals have established a per capita cap for states on Medicaid enrollment. This type of spending cap imposes a restriction on the amount the federal government will contribute per capita to states’ Medicaid budgets. The proposals also increase the amount states must contribute to their Medicaid programs. In practice, per capita caps only increase costs for Medicaid beneficiaries – often in the form of higher premiums and out-of-pocket costs, all but ensuring that even if one qualifies for Medicaid, the services may not be affordable. It also means Medicaid would not have the flexibility to take on an influx of new patients during public health emergencies.
ashoup
In News, Report

NEW REPORT: RFK Jr. Is An Extreme Threat To America’s Health

If RFK Jr. is Confirmed, It Will Cost American Lives.

Read the Report Here.

Washington, D.C. — Protect Our Care is releasing a new national report detailing how Donald Trump is undermining the health and well-being of millions of Americans by nominating Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to be the next Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). RFK Jr. is unqualified and holds dangerous anti-science and anti-vaccination policy positions, ready to put the personal interests of Donald Trump ahead of the health and safety of the American people. The potential damage cannot be understated as HHS oversees health care for the 163 million Americans enrolled in ACA Marketplace plans, Basic Health plans, Medicare, Medicaid, and CHIP – just under half of the U.S. population. Kennedy has vowed to fire and prosecute hundreds of NIH And FDA Employees while also putting a pause on critical vaccine and disease research. 

“People will lose their lives with RFK Jr. as HHS Secretary,” said Protect Our Care Executive Director Brad Woodhouse. “Make no mistake: RFK Jr. is a MAGA loyalist who has no problem being Trump’s puppet. Kennedy’s long history of espousing misinformation has had deadly consequences, and in a position like HHS secretary, the damage would be insurmountable. American families deserve a competent leader regulating the health sector, not some fringe conspiracy theorist dead set on dismantling public health as we know it.”

Here Are Five of the Many Ways RFK Jr. Threatens Public Health:

  1. Kennedy Has Been A Leading Anti-Vaccine Voice For Decades, With Deadly Consequences. As early as 2005, Kennedy has been asserting anti-vaccine conspiracy theories, despite claiming he is fully vaccinated himself. He has said “there’s no vaccine that is safe and effective” and called the life-saving COVID-19 vaccine “a crime against humanity.” He is responsible for a measles epidemic in Samoa costing 83 people their lives, primarily infants and children.
  2. Kennedy Has No Experience Is Completely Unqualified To Lead America’s Health Care System. HHS secretaries are typically seasoned policymakers with lots of experience moving policy through government agencies, managing large organizations, and being accountable to the public. Kennedy has no relevant experience for this position, has never worked in government, and has never directed a large organization of any kind. Kennedy does have a long and well-documented history of erratic and bizarre behavior that may have been in part caused by parasitic brain worms and mercury poisoning.
  3. Kennedy Says He Will Pause All Research On Drug Development And Infectious Disease. He wants to dismantle drug development and infectious disease research for eight years, and has also claimed that he will go after medical journals and redirect funding away from epidemiology, a practice that seeks to prevent and control the spread of disease.
  4. Kennedy Will Destroy Women and LGBTQ+ Health Care. As the HHS Secretary, the fate of birth control accessibility and coverage would be in his hands, a man who backed a 15-week federal abortion ban. Kennedy has repeatedly shared unfounded conspiracies that man-made chemicals in the environment could be making children gay or transgender and uses gross and barbaric language referring to transgender therapies and medications as “castration drugs” and “surgical mutilation.”
  5. Kennedy Pushes Racist Propaganda, Backing Pseudoscientific Conspiracies.  Kennedy has targeted dangerous and disproven anti-vaccine propaganda at the Black community, while also proposing that the COVID-19 virus may have been ethnically targeted to spare Jewish and Chinese people. Kennedy also claimed that the U.S. was collecting DNA from ethnic Chinese and Russians in order to develop so-called ethnic bio-weapons against foreign adversaries.
ashoup
In Fact Sheet, Research

FACT SHEET: Dr. Mehmet Oz Is A Quack Grifter Unqualified To Administer Health Care For Over 160 Million Americans

By nominating Dr. Mehmet Oz to lead the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), Donald Trump has taken another disastrous step to sabotage Americans’ health care. A staunch MAGA loyalist, Dr. Oz has a close relationship with Trump’s extreme Health & Human Services Secretary nominee Robert F. Kennedy Jr., having promoted his dangerous anti-vaccine conspiracy theories on his show a decade ago. Like Trump, Dr. Oz is a shameless grifter and TV personality; he rose to fame promoting dozens of health scams on his show – including one that led to a multimillion-dollar class action settlement for false advertising. The American Medical Association’s Journal of Ethics has called him “a dangerous rogue unfit for the office of America’s doctor.” 

More than 160 million Americans depend on programs administered by CMS. Trump has given Dr. Oz a mandate to slash Medicaid and Medicare. In the past, Oz has pushed to gut Medicare and force seniors onto expensive privatized plans that limit what doctors they can see, deny them care, cost taxpayers more, and give $200 billion away annually to big insurance companies,  pushing Medicare toward bankruptcy without improving care at all. He even opposes the Affordable Care Act, and he said he would have voted against it. With Dr. Oz and RFK Jr. overseeing the country’s health care sector, the second Trump administration will only lead us into chaos.

Dr. Oz Will Push To Gut Medicare and Push Seniors Onto Expensive Privatized Plans. As head of CMS, Oz would oversee Medicare, which covers over 67 million seniors and people with disabilities. In Trump’s announcement of his intention to appoint Oz as CMS administrator, he suggested cuts to Medicare would be on the table: “[Oz] will also cut waste and fraud within our Country’s most expensive Government Agency, which is a third of our Nation’s Healthcare spend, and a quarter of our entire National Budget.” Republicans often cloak health care cuts as cutting “waste and abuse” while actually risking care for people who need it. Oz previously praised a plan from Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) which would have ended funding for all federal programs, including Medicare, in five years without Congressional action. In 2022, Oz also staked his Senate campaign on forcing millions of seniors off of traditional Medicare and onto privatized plans – a policy right out of Project 2025. He touted his plan as “Medicare Advantage For All,” even though these plans limit what doctors patients can see, deny patients care, cost taxpayers more, give $200 billion away annually to big insurance companies, and push Medicare towards bankruptcy. Experts estimate that if Medicare Advantage (MA) rose to 75 percent of Medicare enrollment, the program would waste nearly $2 trillion over 10 years on excess payments to these private plans “without any real improvement in health care quality for enrollees.” Even now, as lawmakers have worked to rein in overpayments, some MA plans are prioritizing shareholders over patients by decreasing benefits; of the 25 MA parent organizations by number of plan offerings, 76 percent are decreasing their offerings ahead of the upcoming open enrollment period. MA plans are also known to systematically underpay rural providers and deny coverage to rural Americans. Pushing seniors to MA plans would put rural hospitals at risk of closing and seniors at risk of losing access to care.

Dr. Oz Opposes The Affordable Care Act. After he launched his 2022 Senate campaign as a Republican, Oz called the Affordable Care Act (ACA) “wrong,” and said he “would not have voted for Obamacare.” As head of CMS, Oz would be responsible for implementing the ACA’s consumer protections and regulating state Health Insurance Marketplaces.

  • Dr. Oz Believes “Americans Don’t Have The Right To Health.” In a 2013 speech to Republican governors, Oz proclaimed, “[Americans] don’t have the right to health, but they have a right to access — a chance to get that health,” revealing his belief that only Americans who can afford top-tier health insurance deserve quality care.

Dr. Oz Is A Staunch Trump Loyalist and “Friend” To RFK Jr. Oz has always been a Trump loyalist, receiving Trump’s endorsement during his 2022 Senate run after going to “extensive lengths to win over the former president” and his relationship with RFK Jr. goes back at least 10 years to when Oz hosted him on his TV show to spread anti-vaccine misinformation. After Trump announced his selection of Oz for CMS, RFK Jr. proudly posted on X, “Very excited that my friend @DrOz has agreed to run CMS. Thank you ​@realDonaldTrump for this outstanding nomination. Welcome Dr​. Oz to ​The Avengers. ​Let’s Make America Healthy Again!” 

Just Like RFK Jr., Dr. Oz Has Spent His Career Pushing Pseudoscience. Oz has a long record of grifting dietary supplements unsupported by scientific evidence and recommending at-home ailments based on alarming pseudoscience. In 2012, Oz claimed that selenium supplements were “the holy grail of cancer prevention,” with no scientific evidence to back the claim. Instead, studies have found that high rates of selenium intake can cause severe heart problems. In February 2012, Oz baselessly claimed that raspberry ketones were “the No. 1 miracle in a bottle to burn your fat.” As the Public Affairs Council found, “There is a total lack of research on raspberry ketones’ effects on fat loss.” In 2014, Oz encouraged his followers to try using strawberries and baking soda to whiten teeth, even though studies have found that the mixture may harm tooth health. In 2015, Oz baselessly claimed that umckaloabo root extract was “incredibly effective at relieving cold symptoms,” even though the National Center for Biotechnology Information found that “there’s a lack of reliable studies on the benefits of these products.” In 2018, Oz tweeted a bizarre pseudoscientific claim that astrological signs “may reveal a great deal about our health.” During the COVID-19 pandemic, Oz even pushed unproven DIY treatments for the virus, publicly claiming that antimalarial drug hydroxychloroquine could be an effective treatment.

Dr. Oz Pushed Dietary Supplements Falsely Promising Weight Loss, Leading To A Multi-Million Dollar False Advertising Settlement. In July 2018, Oz reached a $5.25 million legal settlement in a class action lawsuit against him for pushing green coffee extract dietary supplements he promised had weight loss benefits. On his TV show, Oz promised that the supplements were a “magic weight-loss cure” and “revolutionary fat buster” despite having no scientific evidence to back his claims. Oz testified before Congress on false advertising in the diet and weight-loss industry four years prior. During the hearing, Oz attempted to defend his products to no avail; as one Senator pointed out, “the scientific community is almost monolithic against you.”

Dr. Oz Holds Extreme Anti-Abortion Views. Oz made it clear he opposed Roe v. Wade’s federal abortion protections. During a 2022 debate, when asked about reproductive health care access, Oz declared, “There should not be involvement from the federal government in how states decide their abortion decisions…I want women, doctors, local political leaders, letting the democracy that’s always allowed our nation to thrive to put the best ideas forward so states can decide for themselves.”

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