The signing of the so-called “Big, Beautiful Bill” into law marks a devastating setback for equitable access to healthcare. This legislation threatens the health and wellbeing of millions of Americans, particularly those already marginalized by systemic inequities.
Among the most dangerous aspects:
- The largest Medicaid cuts in the program’s history, including co-pays that could push millions off their coverage, barriers to care through the elimination of automatic ACA enrollment.
- Funding rollbacks that jeopardize hundreds of hospitals and community health centers, many of them in rural and underserved areas,
- A cruel restriction that removes Medicaid funding from any provider offering abortion care, further limiting access to reproductive healthcare.
- Cuts to SNAP that threaten food security for millions and undermine a critical social determinant of health.
- Expanded subsidies for fossil fuels, despite their well-documented environmental and public health harms, especially for communities already disproportionately burdened by pollution and climate change.
For millions more, care will be harder to access, less affordable, and more fragmented. This legislation will disproportionately harm low-income communities, Black and Brown people, rural populations, and others historically pushed to the margins of the US’ fragmented healthcare system.
At Global Health Corps we know that health is shaped not only by what happens in the doctor’s office, but by policies that govern access to food, housing, clean air, and care. We are steadfast in our commitment to supporting leaders who are building a more just and equitable health system from the ground up. We stand with the community organizers, public health leaders, and systems thinkers who are working across silos to meet their communities’ needs.
We remain committed to supporting the next generation of leaders who are reimagining what a just, equitable health system can look like. Their work is more essential than ever.
Now is the time to double down, not divest, from public health.