PRAIRIE DU CHIEN — Ahead of former President Donald Trump’s event in Prairie du Chien on Saturday, Wisconsin physicians gathered virtually today to share their concerns about Trump’s likely plans to repeal the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and enact a national abortion ban. [RECORDING HERE].
“I became a doctor so I could help people who are suffering. I’ve learned over my career that in order to do that sometimes I need to step out of the exam room to do what I can to make my patient’s lives easier, even if doing so is uncomfortable,” said Dr. Joel Charles, a family physician in Crawford County. “Today that means making my position clear that as a doctor it’s clear to me Donald Trump is bad for our health. Donald Trump and MAGA Republicans will make people’s lives harder, they will make people sick, they will make medications and health care less accessible and more expensive, and they will limit people’s freedom to make decisions about their health.”
Project 2025, a blueprint for a second Trump presidency written by 140 of Trump’s former aides, includes sweeping restrictions on abortion nationwide.
“As an OBGYN, I am concerned that Donald Trump’s health care vision for America would lead to more health insecurity for patients across Wisconsin and the country — particularly women,” said Dr. Leslie Abitz, an OB/GYN in Kohler. “We know that by eliminating Obamacare, which he tried to do dozens of times when he was in office, Mr. Trump will make contraception more expensive and less accessible for women. Project 2025 recommends several restrictions on abortion that would severely affect the practice and delivery of health care, especially reproductive health care. Mr. Trump isn’t just threatening the security of every Wisconsinite’s health care – he is also threatening doctors’ security by virtually preventing us in many instances from practicing medicine to acceptable standards of care.”
During the presidential debate on Sept. 10, Trump called Obamacare “lousy health care,” and when pressed about how he would change it, said he had “concepts of a plan.”
“Fortunately, in Wisconsin, we have over 200,000 families who find their health insurance through the Affordable Care Act,” said Dr. Mark Neumann, a retired pediatric critical care medicine specialist in La Crosse. “To play with that resource is beyond immoral. To put those families into a circumstance where they would have to worry, ‘How are we going to manage the payment after our child has recovered, or even worse, not survived?’ As former President Trump comes to visit Western Wisconsin, we need people to ask him, ‘Where does he really think he can go with these notions of a health plan?’”
About the Committee to Protect Health Care
The Committee to Protect Health Care is a national mobilization of doctors, health care professionals, and advocates who are building a pro-patient health care majority in Congress and in states so that we can live in an America where everyone has the health care they need to thrive. To learn more: www.committeetoprotect.org
