It’s looking that way.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), the only memberof the upper chamber to endorse single-payer health coverage, said Monday that he plans to introduce an amendment to the Democrats’ health reform legislation that would establish a Medicare-for-all insurance system. “„We have got to understand that one of the reasons that our current health care system is so expensive, so wasteful, so bureaucratic, so inefficient, is that it is heavily dominated by private health insurance companies whose only goal in life is to make as much money as they can. [...]
“„The result is [that] we are wasting about $400 billion a year on administrative costs, profiteering, high CEO compensation packages, advertising and all the other stuff which goes with the goal of private insurance companies to make as much money as [they] can.
Michael Briggs, spokesman for Sanders, said Monday that Democratic leaders have indicated that Sanders’ single-payer proposal could be fourth in line among the amendments to get a vote on the Senate floor — the first vote of its kind in the history of the upper chamber. That the provision is certain not to pass hasn’t discouraged the Vermont Independent.
“I am not naive. I know that we will lose that vote,” Sanders said. “But … at the end of the day — not this year, not next year, but sometime in the future — this country will understand that if we’re going to provide comprehensive, quality care to all of our people, the only way we will do that is through a Medicare-for-all, single-payer system.”