Groups marching in downtown Fayetteville call for Medicaid expansion

Oct. 4--It's bad enough that COVID-19 is disproportionately impacting poor people and minorities, members of a coalition of various groups marching in downtown Fayetteville said Saturday.

But adding insult to injury is the fact that North Carolina is one of only 12 states in the country that has yet to expand Medicaid that could offer health insurance for people fighting the virus, the marchers said.

They also said this insurance coverage is needed now more than ever after thousands of people have lost coverage after losing jobs in the pandemic.

People from different organizations throughout the state showed up for the march. The organizations included the North Carolina Poor People's Campaign, NC Raise Up/Fight for $15, Action NC and Fayetteville PACT.

The primary topic was "health care for all." However, different groups that participated also used the march as a forum to promote their causes.

For example, NC Raise Up/Fight For $15 and a Union advocated for a $15 minimum wage.

Fayetteville PACT leaders outlined their concerns about COVID-19 at the Cumberland County Detention Center, saying the "unsafe and unjust conditions" resulted in the fourth largest COVID-19 outbreak of any jail in the state.

Chermaleta Brown, a mental health advocate at Butterflies and Pearls and supporter of Fayetteville PACT, said health care is a universal right.

"There is a disparity in health care, not just with COVID-19 but before COVID-19," Brown said. "This just makes it worse. It's not just minorities that face this problem, but it's also poor people. This is a health-care crisis that the government has failed to address. And if there is something that is being offered (through Medicaid expansion) to alleviate this, why hasn't North Carolina taken advantage of it?"

She said the march was about getting people out to vote in the next election for candidates who support Medicaid expansion.

"We are out here today letting everybody know our votes matter," she said. "We can change the narrative. It costs us nothing to go out and vote, but it costs us everything when we don't."

State Sen. Kirk deViere, who participated in the march, supports expanding Medicaid but said Republicans in the Senate have held it up.

"Having access to affordable health care is the morally right thing to do, and we as a state legislature need to ensure that people have access to health care, and that can start with Medicaid expansion," he said.

He said for Medicaid expansion to be brought up in the Senate, the Democrats need to hold their seats in the upcoming election and five Republican seats need to be flipped.

DeViere said Senate leader Phil Berger would not even allow the subject to be heard in the last session.

"The Democrats have to take a majority in the Senate for it to be heard," he said.

Republicans and conservatives have argued that expanding Medicaid would have hidden costs for taxpayers, not only in dollars but in the quality of health care for everyone.

DeViere said he would at least like a debate on the subject in the Senate.

Medicaid expansion is meant to offer health insurance to people who make too little to qualify for subsidies under the Affordable Care Act but who make too much under current guidelines to enroll in Medicaid, the program for lower-income Americans. Many who fall into this category are lower-wage workers whose employers do not provide health insurance or do not offer affordable or adequate insurance.

Under the expansion, which started rolling out in 2014, the federal government provides 90 percent of the funding with the state providing the rest. In North Carolina, as many as 500,000 people would be newly eligible for coverage, according to projections.

The march, which drew about 100 people, started in the parking lot of the Cumberland County Courthouse then proceeded to the Market House, where people holding signs marched around it. The group then walked across the street and gave speeches, and then marched to the Cumberland County Detention Center.

Along the way, those marching held up signs for their causes and chanted slogans such as "No justice, no peace," and "This is what democracy looks like."

Many signs advocated for universal health care with slogans like: "I died for the greed of a lot of for-profit health care systems."

The march was organized by the Poor People's Campaign's "Nonviolent Medicaid Army," which identifies itself on its website as "a growing militant force of the poor and dispossessed modeled after Martin Luther King's non-violent army of the poor."

Ana Blackburn, tri-chair for the Poor People's Campaign, said the expansion of Medicaid is not just about offering health coverage to people in serious need of it. She said it's also an economic issue.

"When they hear Medicaid, they just think it's about health," she said. "But all of the issues are interlocked. If people are sick, they can't work. If they can't work, they can't afford housing."

Staff writer John Henderson can be reached at jhenderson@fayobserver.com or 910-486-3596.

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