Showing posts with label Medicaid. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Medicaid. Show all posts

Thursday, July 20, 2017

The Little Couple Fights for Medicaid, Joins Healthcare Debate

As previously reported, The Little Couple will return to TLC this fall.


Jennifer Arnold and Bill Klein have relocated to Florida, however, and will allow cameras to follow them and their two children around their new home state, which the reality stars selected because Arnold was offered a pretty awesome job there.



A doctor, Arnold was previously the medical director of the Simulation Center at Texas Children’s Hospital and the Assistant Professor of Pediatrics, Division of Neonatology at Baylor College of Medicine.


But she’s now working at Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital in St. Petersburg.


She has dedicated her professional life to the well-being of her young patients, while the practicing neonatologist also has an important personal reason to take an interest in children’s healthcare:


She, her husband and their two kids all have skeletal dysplasia, commonly known as dwarfism.


As you may have heard, there is an ongoing debate over a plan to repeal Obamacare and replace it with something called the Better Care Reconciliation Act of 2017.


You don’t read The Hollywood Gossip to delve into the nitty gritty of this proposed legislation, but numerous politicians have come out against this legislation because it cuts Medicaid by billions of dollars.


Because Medicaid goes a long way toward helping kids with disabilities, Arnold is strongly opposed to the plan.


As a result, she, Bill, their five-year old and their six-year old visited Capitol Hill last Thursday to join the Children’s Hospital Association for a day of meetings with members of Congress.



“My goal of putting our lives out there is to raise awareness, so whenever I have opportunity to use this platform … well, that’s why I put up with TV cameras in our house,” Arnold explained at the time.


She and her family are talking to Representative Pete Olson of Texas in the above photo, doing all they can to explain their point of view on health insurance.


Arnold spent her day last week talking to Republicans who have supported the proposed cuts to Medicaid.


“The timing is critical,” she said, adding:


“The BCRA is scary – it would cut $ 43 billion in Medicaid funding, which would more negatively affect kids than adults. We have to speak out. We have to talk to our congresspeople.”



Arnold shared the same sentiment on social media.


As a caption to the photo shared at the outset of this article, she wrote the following:


Please get involved & remind your congress leaders to put kids’ health first! Great time meeting with members of congress to talk kids’ healthcare coverage! @speaknowforkids #littlecouple.


We aren’t about to tell readers what to think when it comes to this topic.


But we can all likely agree that it’s refreshing to see a reality star use her platform for something she truly cares about, for something that affects millions of people, as opposed to simply shilling for her own lip kit, right?


Well done, Dr. Arnold.



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