Take Action: Green New Deal for Health
Healthcare and climate are linked
Jane O’Meara Sanders of The Sanders Institute via People Power United
Too often, conversations about our politics reduce everything to a fight, pitting politician vs. politician, organization vs. organization — even crisis vs. crisis.
Every day, you can turn on your television or radio and hear of wildfires, superstorms, flash floods, and record-breaking heatwaves. Maybe even you have had one of those hit your home town recently.
Every day, you can scroll social media, seeing GoFundMes posted to help a family be able to afford some medical treatment that would otherwise be paid for if they were living in any other industrialized nation. Maybe you know all too well what it is like to be in that situation.
The Sanders Institute was founded on a simple conviction: that a vital democracy requires an informed electorate, civil discourse, and bold ideas. This is one of those bold ideas, and we’d like your name on it.
Senator Ed Markey and Representative Ro Khanna have reintroduced the Green New Deal for Health in Congress. This sweeping legislation would ensure that as we build the clean energy economy of the 21st century, we do not leave behind the clinics, hospitals, and nurses who keep our country healthy.
Here is what the bill does:
● $130 billion over five years to improve and expand community health centers, which are the backbone of primary care for tens of millions of working Americans, and the front door of medicine for communities too often left at the back of the line.
● $100 billion in federal grants to modernize public and nonprofit hospitals for climate resilience, modeled on the Hill-Burton Act, the same program that built America’s rural hospital system in the 1950’s after World War 2. We’ve dramatically expanded public healthcare services before. We can do it again.
● Grant priority to facilities that collectively bargain with their workers, and provide hazard pay for the nurses and aides who show up when the heat dome settles in or the power goes out. The people who care for us and our neighbors deserve a system that respects their essential labor and skills.
● Expand Medicare coverage for solar batteries, heat pumps, and other resilience upgrades for people with disabilities and serious medical needs. For seniors on oxygen and neighbors on ventilators, these upgrades are the difference between staying safe at home and ending up in the ER during a blackout.
● Strengthen transparency and accountability in the medical supply chain, so that the drugs and devices we depend on are not just safe in our bodies, but safe for the planet our bodies depend on.
Take Action» Support the Green New Deal for Health
This is the kind of generational investment in community health care and health infrastructure that working people have been waiting decades for.
The Sanders Institute is collecting citizen cosponsors from across the country. When we deliver this list to Congress, we want your name to be on it.
The Sanders Institute is proud to be a supporter of this effort, alongside leading organizations including the American Federation of Teachers, Alliance of Nurses for Healthy Environments, Alzheimer’s Foundation of America, American College of Nurse-Midwives, Committee of Interns and Residents (CIR-SEIU), Earthjustice Action, Green & Healthy Homes Initiative, National Hispanic Medical Association, National Nurses United, People Power United and many more.
The Senate bill is led by Senator Markey and cosponsored by Senators Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Jeff Merkley, and Cory Booker, with House leadership from Representative Ro Khanna, co-sponsored by Representatives Maxwell Frost, Rashida Tlaib, and Ilhan Omar, among others.
The drug companies, the hospital monopolies, and the fossil fuel industry have lobbyists in Washington every single day. What they do not have is a public mandate. When thousands of constituents sign on as citizen cosponsors, members of Congress cannot pretend this is a fringe idea. They have to answer for it.
Please add your name to the list today.
Movements are not built by billionaires. They are built name by name, person by person.
The 21st-century economy demands a 21st-century health system. One that is prepared for climate change, that puts working people first, and that treats health care as a human right.
In solidarity,
Jane O’Meara Sanders
Co-Founder, The Sanders Institute
💥Your Power in Action: What You Can Do Today
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This connection between environment and health (or sickness) can't be overstated. Most cancer starts in our environment because of contaminants, pollutants, and a lack of proper, nutritious whole foods. Food isn't as nutritious as it was during our grandparents' or great-grandparents' lifetimes.
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