This is the the third in my installments on the Presidential Party Platforms. I’m reviewing and comparing the Democrat and Republican Party Platforms.  

I think it’s worth repeating that the Republicans decided to adopt the 2016 Party Platform. On the opening day of the 2020 convention, Republicans announced that they do not have a platform, but will follow Presidents Trump’s direction. Okay, now what? Lacking specifics, I’ll follow my original plan and compare the 2016 Republican Platform with the 2020 Democratic Platform.

The Democratic Party has about 8 pages on health care. The Republican Party has about three pages addressing healthcare.

Just so I can keep everything straight, I put the information into a simple table, like I would for corporate goals. Pretty easy to understand; I think:  We will______________ by_____________ so that______________ happens.  The last column is the page number for your reference.

Note: The day I began researching for this post, President Trump’s campaign announced a 2nd Term Agenda. The goals are many, but only the first part (We will) is addressed. How the goal will be accomplished (the “by”) is missing. Why he wants to accomplish the goal (the “so that”) is also not included. You can find the Agenda by clicking here.

So here’s the Democrats’ Plan for achieving universal, affordable, quality healthcare:

We will	By	So that	Page
Protect, strengthen, and build upon our bedrock health care programs (Affordable Care Act, Medicare, Medicaid,Veterans Affairs (VA) system)	Give all Americans the choice to select a high-quality, affordable public option through the Affordable Care Act marketplace.	Private insurers have competition and incentive to provide affordable, quality coverage to every American.	25
Help close the persistent racial gap in insurance rates	Expand funding for Affordable Care Act outreach and enrollment programs	Every American knows their options for securing quality, affordable coverage.	26
Provide health care to lowest-income Americans	Automatically enroll Medicaid eligible adults without premiums, with the option to opt out at any time	Everyone has the health care system the American people have always deserved	26
Remove barriers to states that seek to experiment with statewide universal health care approaches.	Empowering the states, as laboratories of democracy, to use Affordable Care Act innovation waivers	Everyone has the health care system the American people have always deserved	26
Increase support for dental care, mental health care, and substance use services like medication-assisted treatment, and substance use services	Doubling investments in community health centers and rural health clinics	Rural health clinics keep their doors open	26
Bring down the cost of prescription drugs	Empowering Medicare to at last be able to negotiate prescription drug prices for all public and private purchasers Preventing the price of brand-name and outlier generic drugs from rising faster than the inflation rate	Americans do not pay more for prescription drugs than people in other advanced economies	26
Ensure that effective treatments for chronic health conditions are available at little or no cost.	Capping out-of-pocket drug costs for seniors	Americans do not pay more for prescription drugs than people in other advanced economies	27
Take on Pharmaceutical Companies	Cracking down on anti-competitive efforts to manipulate the patent system or collude on prices. Eliminating tax breaks for prescription drug advertisements.	Americans do not pay more for prescription drugs than people in other advanced economies	27
Make it easier for working families to afford high-quality insurance	Ensuring no one pays more than 8.5% of their income in premiums and eliminating the cap on subsidies.	Reduce Healthcare costs	27
Increase price transparency in the health care system	Outlawing the practice of surprise medical billing using antitrust laws to fight against mega-mergers in the hospital, insurance, and pharmaceutical industries	Reduce Healthcare costs	27
Expand and protect Medicare	Fighting efforts to cut Medicare benefits Finding financially sustainable policies to expand Medicare to cover dental, vision, and hearing.	Prevent severe health consequences for Medicare patient	27
Increase the number of primary care practitioners, registered nurses, dentists, and dental therapists, especially in rural and low-income metropolitan areas	Supporting policies	It’s easier to access preventive and primary health care	27
Expand access to mental health and substance use treatment	Enforcing the federal mental health and substance use disorder parity law Ensuring that health insurers cover mental health and substance use treatment	American who needs it should be able to access mental health care or substance use disorder treatment, no matter where they live	27
Expanding funding for health clinics, especially in rural areas, and increasing access to these services through Medicaid.	Investing in training and hiring more mental health providers, substance use disorder counselors, and peer support counselors	American who needs it should be able to access mental health care or substance use disorder treatment, no matter where they live	27
Fight the opioid epidemic	Making medication-assisted treatment available to all who need it, and requiring publicly supported health clinics to offer medication-assisted treatment for opioid addiction and approved treatments for other substance use disorders	American who needs it should be able to access mental health care or substance use disorder treatment, no matter where they live	28
Eliminate waiting lists for home and community-based care and the institutional bias within Medicaid	Making investments in building the capacity of the Medicaid system to provide home and community-based services.	Long-term care services and support are expanded	28
Help Americans pay for long-term care	Creating a tax credit for informal and family caregivers and increasing the Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit	Long-term care services and support are expanded	28
Improve nursing home staffing and quality standards, strengthen accreditation processes, Combat corporate abuses in nursing homes	Enforcing the Americans with Disabilities Act and fulfilling the promise of the Olmstead v. L.C. decision	Institutional segregation of people with disabilities is eliminated	28
Eliminate gaps in insurance rates, access to quality care, and health outcomes	Launching a sustained, government-wide effort tackling the social, economic, and environmental inequities Ensuring federal data collection and analysis is adequately funded	We eliminate racial, gender, and geographic health inequities	29
Afford access to health care for people living and working across the United States	Expanding the ACA to Dreamers Lift the five-year waiting period for Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program eligibility for low-income, lawfully present immigrants.	We eliminate racial, gender, and geographic health inequities	29
End the HIV/AIDS epidemic	Supporting investments under the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program and the Minority HIV/AIDS Fund	We eliminate racial, gender, and geographic health inequities	29
Pursue environmental justice and climate justice, including for Indigenous peoples and communities	Investing in clean water and  wastewater infrastructure, clean energy generation and distribution, and sustainable and regenerative agriculture	We protect Native American health	29
Honor the United States’ trust obligation to Native American communities	Making mandatory and working toward full funding for the Indian Health Service	We protect Native American health	29
Provide vital preventive and reproductive health care for millions of women	Restoring federal funding for Planned Parenthood Fighting to overturn federal and state laws that create barriers to women’s reproductive health and right Repealing the Hyde Amendment protecting and codifying Roe v. Wade.	We secure reproductive health, rights, and justice	29
Save mothers’ lives	Expanding postpartum Medicaid coverage to a full year after giving birth, investing in rural maternal health, promoting a diverse perinatal workforce, and implementing implicit bias training for health professionals.	We protect and promote maternal health	30
Address every dimension of the Black maternal health crisis	supporting policies and approaches that will at least halve our nation’s unacceptably high maternal mortality rate.	We protect and promote maternal health	30
Restore nondiscrimination protections for LGBTQ+ people in health insurance	Reversing regulations that allow doctors, hospitals, and insurance companies to discriminate against patients based on their sexual orientation or gender identity Requiring that federal health plans provide coverage for HIV/AIDS treatment and HIV prevention medications like PrEP and PEP, gender confirmation surgery, and hormone therapy	We protect LGBTQ+ health	30
Ensure healthcare workers have a family-sustained wage, good benefits, access to training and professional development, and the ability to join a union and collectively bargain.	Requiring all employers funded by taxpayer dollars to pay their workers at least $15/hour and protect workers’ rights to organize	We strengthen and support the health care workforce	31
Invest in Health Science and Research	Increasing funding for health and medical research and federal grants across agencies Increasing the federal investment in research and development for new medications	We are at the forefront of scientific research and discover for the benefit of our people, our economy, and our global competitiveness	31
Break down silos and accelerate research into cancer and cancer treatments	Creating an agency with the sole mission of finding new cures and treatments for cancer and other diseases.	We are at the forefront of scientific research and discover for the benefit of our people, our economy, and our global competitiveness	31
Protect the independence and intellectual freedom of scientists Shield our scientific research agencies from future political interference.	???	We restore the pace of scientific inquiry and America’s standing in the world.	31

Whew! That was a lot of work.  Next up….