U.S. Rep. Don Davis and state Sen. Natalie Murdock joined advocates from the group Protect Our Care North Carolina on Wednesday to discuss the impacts on rural health care that they say will result from the massive Republican budget reconciliation bill pending in Congress — aka the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act.”
Speakers, highlighting what bill opponents have termed “Save Our Hospitals Week,” condemned congressional Republicans for slashing funding for health care in favor of tax breaks for billionaires and big corporations.
The spending bill would cut more than $1 trillion from Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act, according to Congressional Budget Office.
The spending cuts would leave 16 million Americans without health coverage, force rural hospitals to close, and raise premiums for more than 24 million Americans. A release from Protect Our Care said the cuts would put 338 rural hospitals, including five in North Carolina, at risk of closure
U.S. Rep. Don Davis (Photo: House.gov)Davis, a Democrat representing North Carolina’s first congressional district since 2023, described how he was born and raised in downtown Snow Hill.
Over the years, he’s seen the evolution of healthcare near his town of about 2,000 people. When he got elected to the North Carolina Senate, he wanted to make a difference.
“I realized I had to work in health care space… I put health care up there, education, agriculture,” Davis.
He went in thinking his work on the Senate Health Care Committee would be easy, that everybody would agree. Instead, it was “one of the most contentious committees” on which he’s ever worked.
Davis mentioned fighting to expand Medicaid and keep the East Carolina high risk pregnancy center open.
“There’s the greatest health care disparities, we tend to see all of this in eastern North Carolina,” he said.
Sen. Natalie Murdock (D-Durham) (Photo: ncleg.gov)Murdock, a Democrat, represents Durham and Chatham counties in the state Senate. The former has an urban city center while the latter is more rural.
In some of the more rural areas of her district, she said, people need to drive an hour or more to reach a hospital.
“When you’re talking about being in the midst of snow and ice storms and all the weather issues they have, when we already do not have a lot of health care providers in western North Carolina, you can have entire counties where you may have a pediatrician and a family medicine doctor, and that’s about it,” Murdock said.
Both lawmakers issued a plea to North Carolina Republican U.S. Senator Thom Tillis to oppose the cuts as the Senate considers the measure prior to the July 4th holiday.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( NC Democratic lawmakers urge decry impact of GOP mega-bill on rural health care )
Also on site :