On International Women’s Day, Republicans Continue to Block Health Care for Women

Richmond, Virginia—On International Women’s Day, while bipartisan support grows for expanding access to healthcare, extremist Republicans in the State Senate and Congress continue to fight to deny women access to the care they need.  The Senate Republican Caucus in Virginia is still fighting to prevent women from accessing the health care they need by refusing to expand Medicaid, which would benefit more than 169,000 Virginia women. At the federal level, Republican Congressmen including Scott Taylor and Dave Brat have repeatedly voted to strip health care away from their constituents by supporting the American Health Care Act and voting to repeal the Affordable Care Act over and over again. By voting this way, these Republicans are voting to make it more difficult to get preventative care, cancer screenings, and access to birth control and family planning services. Virginia women are tired of Republicans playing games with their access to healthcare, and it is well past time for Virginia to pass a budget with clean Medicaid expansion so that every woman and family can see a doctor when they need to.

“Health care is a fundamental human right, and everyone deserves to see a doctor when they need to without worrying about dire financial consequences down the road. But Republicans in Washington and Richmond are hurling one attack after another on women’s health care with no regard for the real cost of their actions,” Anna Scholl, Executive Director of Progress Virginia said. “Senate Republicans have just a few days left to pass a budget that includes clean Medicaid Expansion, and women are rightly worried that if it doesn’t pass, they won’t have access to the health care they need. Paired with the Trump administration’s attacks on Medicaid and the roll back of the Affordable Care Act’s birth control mandate, women are spending International Women’s Day worried about whether or not they’ll be able to see a doctor when they get sick, and that’s unacceptable.”

Cuts to Medicaid disproportionately impact women, who make up two-thirds of adults with Medicaid coverage, and ​69% of the 9 million peoplecovered by both Medicare and Medicaid are women. The Trump Administration’s attacks on Medicaid make it more difficult for women to access vital health care services including cancer screenings, maternity care, and birth control. Expanding Medicaid in Virginia would allow 400,000 families in our community to get health insurance coverage and get the health care they need when they need it.