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Benjamin Day and Gillian Mason of Healthcare-NOW break down everything you need to know about the social movement to make healthcare a right in the United States. Welcome to Medicare for All!

You can contact the program here.

Credits

Episodes

The Battle of the Letters: Medicare Advantage

By Geri Katz | March 10, 2024

Occasional fistfights aside, most of our legislators make the choice to use their words when they’re angry, and a lot of those words go into public letters they write to presidents, officials, and even each other. Despite the fact that no one else in this country has written or read a letter in decades, the…

Hospital Merger Mania!

By Gillian Mason | February 20, 2024

Here at the Medicare for All Podcast, we love calling out all the bad actors in our healthcare system – greedy insurance companies, soul-less CEOs in Big Pharma,profit-hungry “non-profit hospitals”, and all our favorite villains. Mostly, we look at the ways those predators target sick people and poor people for exploitation, but today we’re looking…

Racial Equity in Healthcare

By Benjamin Day | January 21, 2024

Just this Monday, we celebrated Martin Luther King Day, a tribute to one of the great leaders of the movement for racial justice – but something that often gets forgotten in the flurry of MLK quotes that become memes this time of year is that equity in healthcare was a crucial part of King’s vision.…

Mailbag Episode: Super Fans Edition!

By Geri Katz | December 10, 2023

It’s that time again folks… time for a Mailbag Episode! We reached out to our whole audience and all our supporters to find the pressing questions on everyone’s mind. Or at least we would have if Gillian hadn’t been too busy eating turkey to email our list. So instead, Gillian reached out personally to some…

What even *is* health insurance?

By Geri Katz | November 21, 2023

Open enrollment. Deductible. Coinsurance. HMO. Indemnity plan. If you’re listening this far, you probably have a migraine already. Understanding the language of the health insurance industry, let alone selecting a health insurance plan, can be confusing, frustrating, and disheartening. But never fear – we are here to give you a crash course on everything you…

How the Other Half Lives: Concierge Care

By Geri Katz | October 26, 2023

If you’ve ever had an experience with the American healthcare system, you’ve probably walked away thinking, “Why can’t we have nice things? Or even basic human things??” We get stuck on gurneys sitting in ER hallways, waiting hours for care; we skip other basic needs like food and housing to pay for the healthcare we…

The Price is Right (for Prescription Drugs)!

By Geri Katz | September 30, 2023

Just over a month ago we lost Bob Barker, the man who taught us all about the brutal nature of capitalism one pricing game at a time. Now, thanks to the Inflation Reduction Act, the federal government is going to be playing a role in determining the prices for some of our favorite products. No,…

Transgender Healthcare Under Attack

By Benjamin Day | August 28, 2023

With all the threats facing our country – climate change, a predatory economy, corporations buying our elections, and the overt move towards fascism among the far right – you would think that politicians would be laser-focused on the existential crises descending upon us. But instead, politicians in the US are devoting a considerable amount of…

Not-So-Nice Ratio

By Geri Katz | August 12, 2023

Almost every patient in America has had a frustrating experience in a hospital setting where we feel like we’re on a medical conveyor belt that moves WAY too slowly. We sit for too long in a waiting room; then our nurses or doctors speak with us very briefly; we might feel more like we’re filling…

The Office

By Geri Katz | July 14, 2023

Today we bring you behind the scenes into our office at Healthcare NOW. Just like the TV show The Office, we have our hijinks and wacky characters, including some very smart interns! They have prepped some of their burning questions for this episode. First, from Intern Noah from Boston College: In your opinion, what is…

Healthcare Goes to Hollywood

By Geri Katz | July 1, 2023

It’s summer, the sun is blazing, and we only have one thing on our minds – the upcoming thirtieth anniversary of the high-octane, expertly paced thriller The Fugitive, originally released August 6, 1993 starring Harrison Ford. Oh, and Medicare for All. We’re always thinking about Medicare for All. Now that we mention it, isn’t it…

But…there will be wait times!

By Geri Katz | June 16, 2023

As Tom Petty taught us all in the 1980s, Waiting is the Hardest Part. That’s even more true when you’re waiting to see a doctor for a problem that needs attention. Anyone who has ever tried to secure a doctor’s appointment in this country knows that a) it’s going to be harder than scoring Taylor…

The Train Has Left the Station

By Geri Katz | June 3, 2023

Usually we spend our time on this podcast talking about our for-profit healthcare system and why we need to make healthcare a public good, but in this episode we’re taking a detour into another privatized American system that should be public: our railroads! Just like in US healthcare, private companies are falling asleep at the…

American Hospitals – Healthcare Villains?

By Benjamin Day | May 19, 2023

Virtually all Americans know that our healthcare system is broken and that it’s working against us. But who is the villain in this story? Who is responsible for maintaining this healthcare system, and using it to profit off of patients? If we had to round up the usual suspects in a lineup, we’d probably end…

Private Equity’s Path of Destruction in Health Care

By Geri Katz | May 1, 2023

If you missed our annual Single Payer Strategy Conference, it’s your lucky day. Today we share a conference presentation all about the impact of Private Equity on healthcare (spoiler alert: it’s not good.) Our guests are Eagan Kemp, Health Care Policy Advocate at Public Citizen; Rachel Madley, Health Policy Advisor to Medicare for All Act…

50 Shades of “No”: How to Respond to Your Legislator’s Excuses and Evasions

By Geri Katz | April 10, 2023

When kids turn two or three years old, they learn to tell what is called a “primary lie,” which is lying without much sophistication or awareness of how the listener will perceive the lie (hint: you completely failed to fool your parents). But when we turn four, we learn to tell “secondary lies,” which take…

Would You Rather: the Healthcare Edition

By Geri Katz | March 24, 2023

Back in 2008, the TV show Breaking Bad asked a question that is still on a lot of Americans’ minds: How far would you go to pay for medical care? In Breaking Bad, the main character ends up building a meth empire to pay for his cancer treatment, which is a solution we don’t necessarily…

10 Years of M4A

By Gillian Mason | March 16, 2023

2013 was a big year — we had just survived 2012 (the year the Mayans thought the world was going to end), we were all doing the Harlem Shake on Vine, and — most importantly — our regular co-host Ben Day became the Executive Director of Healthcare NOW, the nation’s leading Medicare for All advocacy…

This Little Pandemic Went to Market

By Geri Katz | February 28, 2023

Starting on May 11, President Biden is ENDING the emergency COVID-19 regulations that have been in place since the start of the pandemic in January 2020. These regulations created (almost) a Medicare for All-type public funding system for vaccines, testing, and COVID-related care. While the pandemic itself is still raging, the end of the official…

Give Me Healthcare or Give Me Debt!

By Geri Katz | February 21, 2023

Our guest today is Rebecca Wood. Rebecca lived all over Virginia before her relocation to Massachusetts. Rebecca worked with many organizations and offices on Capitol Hill. Her healthcare work includes rallies, protests, press conferences, and conventions. Most notable, she told her and daughter Charlie’s story at the introduction of Senator Sanders’ Medicare For All Act…

Digital Healthcare Dystopia

By Geri Katz | February 3, 2023

Like many of our episodes, this topic drives our hosts to use some salty language. Use your best judgment if you’re listening near someone with tender ears. Hike up your trousers and throw on some long socks. We’re getting into the weeds on this one. Ben and Gillian discuss the digitization of our healthcare system…

Bringing the Fight to 2023

By Geri Katz | January 19, 2023

It’s a new year, which means everyone is coming out of the woodwork to make predictions about what’s in store for 2023. In this episode, we’re going to be making reckless, unverifiable claims about the future of the movement for healthcare justice, the public health crisis in this country, the political landscape, and yes –…

Network So Small!

By Benjamin Day | December 18, 2022

Listeners, how many times has this happened to you? You find a great doctor, you make an appointment, and you think everything is fine… until you get the dreaded call from the insurance company that your sweet new doc is “Out of Network.” Well, you aren’t alone – just in the past few months, limited…

Midterms: Chicken Soup for the Electoral Soul

By Geri Katz | November 24, 2022

The 2022 midterm elections are MOSTLY in the books – thank again Georgia, for the endless run-offs that keep on giving, every two years it seems like. You’ve heard the national narrative: Democrats did surprisingly well, given how parties in power usually take big losses during the mid-terms, and particularly when Biden has such low…

In Sickness and in Health Insurance

By Geri Katz | November 11, 2022

Today we’re talking about the relationship between taking your vows and taking your medicine. In 2020, more than a quarter of folks who got married said they took the plunge because one of the partners involved needed health insurance, and it seems like some couples are staying together for the insurance as well. In this…

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