President Biden hammered home his commitment to reproductive healthcare and touted his administration’s health-related accomplishments — from lowering drug costs to expanding access to affordable healthcare — during his State of the Union address on Thursday evening.
The president pledged to reinstate Roe v. Wade if he had the equipment to do so. He also announced plans to cap the cost of insulin for all Americans who want it, decrease the value of more drugs and remove the Affordable Care Act from attempts to repeal it.
Reproductive Rights, Abortion, IVF
The president waited a long time in his speech to bring up the simmering debate over in vitro fertilization (IVF). “History is witnessing a new attack on American freedom,” he said in the first 10 minutes of his speech, drawing similarities between the attacks. about reproductive rights and the Jan. 6 attack on the U. S. Capitol.
In February, the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos are young in the eyes of the state. Parties to the abortion dispute have long argued that life begins at conception, and abortion rights advocates can identify the “personality” of fertilized eggs. As a result of this decision, fertility clinics in Alabama stopped IVF treatments.
Biden shared the story of Latorya Beasley, a social worker from Birmingham, Alabama, and guest of First Lady Jill Biden that night, who had a baby girl through IVF and was making plans to have a second child when the Supreme Court’s ruling state will close access. to IVF treatment throughout the state.
“She was told her dream would have to wait,” Biden said. “So tonight, let’s stand up for families like hers. To my friends across the aisle, don’t keep this waiting any longer,” he said, referring to a bill Democrats claim Republicans are blocking that aims to protect the right of IVF for all Americans. (On Wednesday, Alabama passed a law to protect physicians from possible legal liability for performing IVF, and clinics have restarted the procedures, but the law does not address the legal status of embryos.)
The saga was one more ripple effect of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, which ended the constitutional right to an abortion, Biden said.
At least 21 states have passed laws banning, restricting, and criminalizing abortion in the wake of the 2022 Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization case.
Kate Cox of Dallas, another guest at Thursday’s speech, was also searching for a child, but her fetus was suffering from a life-threatening illness, Biden said. Her doctor told Cox that her life and her ability to have her children were in danger if she did so. She did not act, however, a Texas law forced Cox to leave the state to have an abortion. “There are state laws that prohibit freedom of choice, criminalize doctors, and force survivors of rape and incest to leave their state to get the remedy they need,” Biden said. Meanwhile, Republican members of Congress, as well as former President Donald Trump, have promised a federal ban on reproductive freedoms, she warned.
“If my fellow Americans send me a Congress that supports the right to choose, I promise you that I will restore Roe v. Wade as the law of the land,” Biden said.
Reduce drug costs and expand into insurance.
Biden also highlighted some key achievements in fitness care, adding expanding fitness insurance and lowering drug prices.
“Today, more people than ever have fitness insurance,” the president said. According to the White House, twenty-one million Americans get fitness insurance through the Affordable Care Act marketplaces, an increase of nine million since he took office. And more than a hundred million Americans are denied insurance because of pre-existing conditions.
Although “my predecessor” and other Republicans are still repealing Obamacare, Biden said, “I won’t let that happen. “
As for drug costs, Biden said Americans pay more for prescription drugs than any other country in the world. But thanks to the Inflation Reduction Act, Medicare for the first time has the strength to negotiate the costs of some of the most expensive drugs, he said. .
“It’s now time to go further and give Medicare the power to negotiate lower prices for 500 different drugs over the next decade,” he said, adding such actions would save taxpayers $200 billion.
In addition, until 2025, the law will cap the cost of prescription drugs for Medicare beneficiaries at $2,000 per year, he said. “I’m going to cap the cost of prescription drugs at $2,000 a year for everybody,” he said.
The bill also targets the high price of insulin. “Instead of paying $400 a month, or thereabouts, for insulin for diabetes that only costs 10 bucks to make, [manufacturers] only get paid $35 a month now and still make a healthy profit,” he said. “I want to cap the cost of insulin at $35 a month for every American that needs it. Everyone.”
Gun violence, the COVID pandemic
Moving on to gun violence, Biden shared the story of Jazmin Cazares of Uvalde, Texas, whose 9-year-old sister murdered along with 20 of her classmates and teachers at her elementary school.
After being there with the first lady, President Biden recalled being told to “do something. “That’s why he created the first Office of Gun Violence Prevention at the White House, he said, which is overseen by Vice President Kamala Harris. .
He also signed “the ultimate gun protection law in just about 30 years,” Biden said, referring to the bipartisan Safer Communities Act, passed by Congress in 2022.
“We now must beat the NRA [National Rifle Association] again,” he said, urging a ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines. “Pass universal background checks,” he added. “None of this violates the Second Amendment or vilifies responsible gun owners.”
Separately, Biden asked Americans to recall the dark days of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Do not be afraid. Record losses. . . [a] raging virus that has claimed the lives of more than a million Americans,” Biden said. “My predecessor failed in his ultimate basic presidential duty to the American people: the duty of care. “
“It doesn’t make news, [but] in a thousand cities and towns the American people are writing the greatest comeback story never told,” he added.
Finally, Biden, who has a stutter and stumbled over some words at various points during the address, acknowledged concerns about his age. “Whether young or old … I’ve always known what endures,” he said. “I’ve known our North Star. The very idea of Americans, that we’re all created equal … We’ve never fully lived up to that idea. We’ve never walked away from it, either, and I won’t walk away from it now.”
Shannon Firth has been reporting on fitness policies as MedPage Today’s Washington correspondent since 2014. He is a member of the Enterprise team.