<html><head><meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body dir="auto"><div><span></span></div><div><div>Courtesy of the <i>Idaho Statesman</i> at:</div><div><br></div><div><a href="http://www.idahostatesman.com/news/local/article149013339.html">http://www.idahostatesman.com/news/local/article149013339.html</a></div><div><br></div><div>---------------------------------</div><div><h1 class="title" style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 14px 0px 21px; font-family: 'McClatchy Slab', Georgia, Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-weight: 400; line-height: 1.3; font-size: 45px; padding: 0px; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;">Labrador: ‘Nobody dies because they don’t have access to health care’<div style="box-sizing: border-box; width: 1px; height: 1px; font-size: 10pt; line-height: normal; font-family: sans-serif; overflow: hidden;"><br style="box-sizing: border-box;">Read more here: <a href="http://www.idahostatesman.com/news/local/article149013339.html#storylink=cpy">http://www.idahostatesman.com/news/local/article149013339.html#storylink=cpy</a></div></h1><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">A statement made by U.S. Rep. Raul Labrador during a town hall meeting Friday morning has drawn criticism by those challenging his stance on health care. </span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">After a woman suggested that the lack of health care was essentially asking people to die, Labrador had a controversial answer at Lewis-Clark State College in Lewiston. </span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">“That line is so indefensible,” Labrador said. “Nobody dies because they don’t have access to health care.”</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">A video of the statement, posted on YouTube by Tom Hansen, drew attention from national news outlets, <a href="http://www.cnn.com/videos/politics/2017/05/06/labrador-health-care-acosta-sot-ac.cnn" target="_blank" title="" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; background-position: 0px 0px;">including CNN</a>.</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">An email to Labrador’s press secretary late Friday for comment did not receive an immediate response.</span></p><div class="ndn_embed ndn_embedding ndn_embedContainer ndn-widget-embed-1 ndn_embedded" id="ndn-video-player-1" data-config-distributor-id="91088" data-config-width="100%" data-config-height="9/16w" style="box-sizing: border-box;"></div><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Labrador on Thursday voted in favor of the American Health Care Act, pushed by the GOP through the House. </span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">“All across Idaho, families and small-business owners are struggling to keep up with skyrocketing health care costs caused by Obamacare,” Labrador said in a statement after the Thursday vote. “The people of Idaho know Obamacare is a disaster and want it fully repealed. Since I was first elected to Congress, I’ve been working to repeal Obamacare and that includes opposing the first version of the American Health Care Act. </span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">“Over the last few months, I have been working to improve the AHCA, joining with my colleagues in the House Freedom Caucus. We have negotiated legislation that keeps our promise to the American people to lower health care costs while also protecting those with per-existing conditions. Furthermore, unlike the first version of AHCA, our bill showed it had enough support to actually pass the House.”</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">The AHCA does set up a high-risk pool that was meant to offset the cost for those with pre-existing conditions, something that has brought heavy criticism from Democrats and sick people.</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">“The bill we passed today strikes down Obamacare’s prohibition on less expensive health care plans and the knot of insurance regulations and mandates that are making health coverage so unaffordable,” Labrador said Friday. “Meanwhile, it sets up a national $130 billion invisible high-risk pool to help offset the cost for those with pre-existing conditions.” </span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><font color="#000000"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><a href="http://www.idahostatesman.com/news/politics-government/state-politics/article145631354.html" target="_blank" title="" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; background-position: 0px 0px;">At a town hall in Meridian in April</a>, about 800 people attended, many of whom had questions about health care. Criticism came when when a woman asked Labrador whether he believed that health care is a right. Labrador said <a href="http://www.idahostatesman.com/news/politics-government/politics-columns-blogs/politics-blog/article145800684.html" target="_blank" title="" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; background-position: 0px 0px;">no.</a></span></font></p><h3 style="box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.25em; margin-top: 20px; margin-bottom: 10px; padding: 0px;"><font size="3"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">FACT CHECK: HAS ANYONE DIED?<span class="ng-command" data-value="252" style="box-sizing: border-box;"></span></span></font></h3><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">The ongoing dispute over whether to fill the so-called Medicaid gap in Idaho has brought forward stories of people who actually died because of the lack of access to health care. </span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">The story of Jenny Steinke, a woman from Idaho Falls, has been frequently cited in Idaho.<a href="http://www.idahostatesman.com/news/business/article41425458.html" target="_blank" title="" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; background-position: 0px 0px;"> Steinke died at age 36 from an asthma attack after her condition had gone untreated</a> for years because she couldn’t afford health insurance, according to the (Idaho Falls) Post Register.</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">But how often does lack of health insurance, or access to health care, cause people to die?</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">That has been a subject of debate, with two fact-checking organizations — <a href="http://www.factcheck.org/2009/09/dying-from-lack-of-insurance/" target="_blank" title="" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; background-position: 0px 0px;">FactCheck.org</a> and <a href="http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2013/sep/06/alan-grayson-claims-45000-people-die-year-because-/http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2013/sep/06/alan-grayson-claims-45000-people-die-year-because-/" target="_blank" title="" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; background-position: 0px 0px;">Politifact</a> — looking into it. Some question whether it’s possible to find a definite cause-and-effect relationship between insurance and death.</span></p><div id="story-related" class="story-related element-spacing-large" style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-bottom: 40px; border-top-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0px 15px; clear: both; border-left-width: 2px; border-left-style: solid; border-left-color: rgb(38, 120, 196); margin-top: 40px; width: 500px;"><h1 style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; line-height: 1; padding: 0px; top: -2px; position: relative; display: inline-block; border-bottom-style: none; border-top-left-radius: 0px; border-top-right-radius: 0px; border-bottom-right-radius: 0px; border-bottom-left-radius: 0px; min-width: 0px; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0); background-position: 0px 0px;"><font size="3">RELATED STORIES FROM THE IDAHO STATESMAN</font></h1><div id="related-links" style="box-sizing: border-box;"><article style="box-sizing: border-box; border-bottom-style: none; padding-bottom: 0px;"><div class="teaser" style="box-sizing: border-box; border-bottom-style: none;"><h4 class="title" style="box-sizing: border-box; font-weight: 400; line-height: 1.25; margin: 10px 0px 0px; padding: 0px;"><a href="http://www.idahostatesman.com/news/politics-government/state-politics/article145668554.html#storylink=related_inline" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0); background-position: 0px 0px;"><font color="#000000">U.S. Congressman Raul Labrador holds a town hall meeting in Meridian</font></a></h4></div></article></div></div><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Researchers have found links for years between insurance and health outcomes. And several high-profile studies have drawn connections between lack of insurance and higher mortality rates.</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">“Because people without health coverage are less likely than those with insurance to have regular outpatient care, they are more likely to be hospitalized for avoidable health problems and to experience declines in their overall health,” <a href="http://kff.org/uninsured/fact-sheet/key-facts-about-the-uninsured-population/" target="_blank" title="" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; background-position: 0px 0px;">according to the Kaiser Family Foundation</a>, a nonpartisan health care information nonprofit. “When they are hospitalized, uninsured people receive fewer diagnostic and therapeutic services and also have higher mortality rates than those with insurance.”</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Some studies cited by the foundation looked at what happened to patients once they were hospitalized:</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><span class="ng_z_sym_square_bullet" style="box-sizing: border-box;">▪ </span> A 2009 <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19875420" target="_blank" title="" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; background-position: 0px 0px;">study published in the Journal of Public Health </a>found a 60 percent higher mortality rate among uninsured American children in the hospital.</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><span class="ng_z_sym_square_bullet" style="box-sizing: border-box;">▪ </span> A<a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3208649/" target="_blank" title="" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; background-position: 0px 0px;"> study published in 2011 </a>in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine concluded that “the uninsured have a higher mortality and receive fewer procedures when compared with privately insured patients treated at the same hospitals.”</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><span class="ng_z_sym_square_bullet" style="box-sizing: border-box;">▪ </span> A<a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20359573" target="_blank" title="" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; background-position: 0px 0px;"> 2010 study in The American Journal of Surgery</a> hypothesized that insurance coverage wouldn’t affect the outcomes of patients with blunt and penetrating traumas, such as car crash injuries and gunshot wounds. But the researchers concluded that insurance coverage was actually “a potent predictor” of how well a patient would do. They found a higher death rate among uninsured patients.</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">A frequently cited study <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2775760/" target="_blank" title="" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; background-position: 0px 0px;">published in 2009 in the American Journal of Public Health </a>found a 25 percent higher risk of death among uninsured compared with privately insured adults. The researchers calculated 44,789 deaths among Americans age 18 to 64 in a single year that they said were tied to lack of health insurance.</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; line-height: 1.5em;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">“The uninsured have a higher risk of death when compared to the privately insured, even after taking into account socioeconomics, health behaviors and baseline health,” the study’s lead author, Dr. Andrew Wilper, <a href="http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2009/09/new-study-finds-45000-deaths-annually-linked-to-lack-of-health-coverage/" target="_blank" title="" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; background-position: 0px 0px;">said at the time</a>. “We doctors have many new ways to prevent deaths from hypertension, diabetes, and heart disease — but only if patients can get into our offices and afford their medications.”</span></p><div style="box-sizing: border-box; width: 1px; height: 1px; line-height: normal; overflow: hidden;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><br style="box-sizing: border-box;">Read more here: <a href="http://www.idahostatesman.com/news/local/article149013339.html#storylink=cpy">http://www.idahostatesman.com/news/local/article149013339.html#storylink=cpy</a></span></div></div><div>---------------------------------<br><br><div><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Seeya 'round town, Moscow, because . . .</span></div><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><br></span></div><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">"Moscow Cares" (the most fun you can have with your pants on)</span></div><div><a href="http://www.moscowcares.com/" style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><font color="#000000">http://www.MoscowCares.com</font></a></div><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"> </span></div><div><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Tom Hansen</span></div><div><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Moscow, Idaho</span></div></div><div><br></div></div></div></div></body></html>