Some 500 women health care leaders are rallying support for Vice President Kamala Harris in the final weeks before the election. “We have seen what happened in the first administration under Trump, so we have very clear evidence of — the direction away from science, away from access to care — and we’re deeply concerned,” said Missy Krasner, who led health care projects at Google and Amazon and served as a special adviser to the national coordinator for health information technology in the George W. Bush administration. The group launched their effort in September with a list of 200 women — ranging from corporate executives and investors to academics and doctors — pledging their support for Harris’ presidential bid. Now, the group has more than doubled. The women plan to spend the remainder of this month drumming up support for Harris in their home states and at health conferences this month. Why Harris-Walz? The women say they believe Donald Trump, the Republican candidate, would reduce funding for Medicaid and Medicare spending and repeal the Affordable Care Act. They say that would reduce insurance coverage for Americans and lead to worse health outcomes. Trump has said he would protect Medicare funding. He hasn’t laid out his plans for Medicaid. On Obamacare, he’s said he’ll try again to replace it, but hasn’t said with what. If the law were repealed, an estimated 21 to 24 million people would lose insurance, according to the Commonwealth Fund, a progressive health care advocacy group. “We know that when we take away health care, it leads to worse outcomes, period, full stop,” said Laurie McGraw, executive vice president at employee health navigator Transcarent. She and her compatriots are also concerned about the future of reproductive rights since the Supreme Court ruled that abortion isn’t a federally protected right and sent the matter back to the states — a decision Trump takes credit for. “There are now over 200 pregnancy-related criminalizations since the overturn of Roe — that’s in a one-year time frame,” said Krasner. “That's the beginning. We don’t want that to advance.” Most of the allegations were related to drug use by pregnant people.
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