For Immediate Release - SEPTEMBER 13, 2011
Contact: Avram Goldstein 202-587-1634
agoldstein@healthcareforamericanow.org

Washington, DC - Health Care for America Now (HCAN), the nation's leading grassroots health care advocacy organization, expressed outrage today at comments made last night at a GOP forum in which presidential candidates indicated they'd sooner abandon an uninsured person to die than see the government play a role in providing access to life-saving health care.

In response to questions from CNN's Wolf Blitzer, candidate Ron Paul said people should go without insurance if they like, and audience members shouted that a severely ill person should be allowed to die if he had no health insurance. Paul said uninsured people with expensive, long-term medical problems should turn to their churches and relatives rather than expect to be helped by a government safety net. None of the other presidential candidates objected.

See a clip of the GOP debate exchange here.

"Last night the Republicans made a shocking public display of their brazen disregard for the well-being of 50 million uninsured people," said HCAN Executive Director Ethan Rome. "When the GOP talks about the freedom of uninsured people to wither and die, they're also talking about restoring the freedom of insurance companies to jack up your premium rates, deny your care and abuse families and small businesses. That's the way it was before the Affordable Care Act passed in 2010. They reject the idea that our government has any role at all in setting rules that stop insurance companies from mistreating the public and that make health insurance affordable for families and small businesses. Republicans have zero concern about the needs of working and middle-class families who cannot afford the medical care they need."

Lack of health insurance causes 45,000 deaths a year in the U.S. Witnessing members of the audience at Monday's Tea Party forum shout that it would be better to let a 30-year-old man die than to have our government provide access to health care tells us all we need to know about the real family values of the Republicans, Rome said.

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Health Care for America Now is the nation's leading grassroots health care advocacy organization. HCAN led the fight over the past two years to win passage of health reform and to keep Congress from being steamrolled by corporate special interests.