VOICES

Heller's medical hostages: Leal

Vivian Leal
Vivian Leal

A year ago, past midnight and into the early morning hours, I sat at my desk with my face inches from the screen, my heart racing. I was trying to track one man across the screen.

Just a month before, four other patients with serious chronic conditions (cancer, multiple sclerosis, cystic fibrosis, liver failure) and I had met face to face with Sen. Dean Heller to challenge the senator’s idea of what patients with serious illness are like, why we matter, and enlist his protection. ("Proposed GOP health bill would kill," July 18, 2017). We accessed health care coverage differently, through employer plans, private plans, Medicaid and the Nevada health care exchange, but all of us require continued care.

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He held many of our lives in his hands; we thought his was a key swing vote since back then he was still proclaiming himself a moderate. He seemed to understand. We asked him for a firm commitment that he would stay a “no”. He said, “I don't see how I get to a yes.” That’s a quote. He had his picture taken with us. I came home and asked people to keep an open mind about him. That was a mistake.

As the vote on the screen grew near, my onerous sense of alarm grew. I saw Heller speaking with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. He was clearly agitated; Vice President Mike Pence was on the Senate floor. Everyone was negotiating and trying to strong-arm Sen. McCain to vote yes. Would Heller betray us?

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Yes. He did. Shortly afterward he received massive campaign funds from the McConnell-linked Senate Leadership Fund, and eventually the president personally returned the favor by eliminating Heller´s challenger on the right, Danny Tarkanian.

Since, Heller has followed up his ACA sabotage by helping to write a tax bill that guts key provisions that enable everyone to be covered. He's dropped all pretense of protecting patients and watched silently as Nevada health care premiums have risen more than 45 percent for less coverage. We pay around $843 more for less. He's hurting the people he represents and refuses to face us in an open, public town hall.

Heller´s betrayal perpetuates a state and a nation of medical hostages. We have them in every family and every social group. Our collective lack of health care as a country is a crisis-level plague on our citizens. The sicker we are, the higher the profits for an exploitative industry and the larger the donations Heller pulls in from them. Our Nevada senator is complicit in a legislatively enabled racket where everyone makes a killing while patients pay, suffer and die. He sold us out. He doesn't deserve our vote.

Vivian Leal is a Reno resident.