Health

The GOP tax bill passed today! And it repeals the “individual mandate” written into the Affordable Care Act, AKA the Obamacare provision that mandated that all people buy health insurance. Though Obamacare was far from a perfect program, the mandate repeal that’s sneakily included in the draconian, monstrous “Tax Cuts and Jobs Act” today is expected to destabilize all sorts of insurance markets and ultimately force millions of people off of their health plans.

Last month, Gov. Rick Scott proposed a three-day limit on opioid prescriptions as part of his upcoming legislation and $50 million investment to combat the opioid crisis in Florida. Though the details of Scott’s bill are still unclear, some physicians and patients such as Paulson say the limitation is too broad and could make it all but impossible to treat chronic pain and terminal illnesses.

So many terrible ideas come out of Tallahassee every year that it’s often hard to guess whether a random law was enacted in Florida or Saudi Arabia. Case in point: One of those two states passed a law in March 2016 forcing anyone giving “advice” about abortion — from a…

There are 21 million people in Florida. Sen. Marco Rubio is almost certainly about to vote for an Obamacare repeal bill that, according to a study released yesterday, would likely cut health coverage from 3.2 million of them. That’s roughly 15 percent of the state.

While tens of thousands of Floridians were without electricity or internet this week, Senate Republicans were busy devising new and ingenious ways to strip health care from millions of people. Now that most Floridians have cell-phone service again, they should spend the week calling Sen. Marco Rubio…

South Florida has the highest HIV rate in America thanks in part to intravenous drug use. But the head of the Miami’s police union, Javier Ortiz, has now repeatedly called for the city to kill a program designed to slow the rate of AIDS infections and save the lives of IV drug addicts.

Ask 100 Floridians to rattle off Publix’s slogan and guaranteed, 100 of them will be able to answer: “Where shopping is a pleasure.” The state’s most beloved supermarket has a stellar reputation for killer chicken tender Pub subs, free deli meat slices, and employee-friendly policies. But beyond the buffed-to-a-shine aisles…

Senate Republicans released a new version of their Obamacare repeal yesterday. They called the bill a “tamer” version of the barbaric law they originally pitched, but the new measure would still hack deep cuts to Medicaid funding for poor people. According to all currently available science, cutting Medicaid kills poor people…

Nothing motivates your constituents quite like actively trying to kill them. Today left-leaning organizers across the nation are protesting at Senate and congressional offices, demanding that GOP lawmakers abandon plans to nuke Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act and to replace them with the legal equivalent of paper clips and twine.

In a Facebook Live session with his constituents last week, Sen. Marco Rubio laid out the things he wanted to see in the U.S. Senate’s then-secret Obamacare repeal package. He listed four criteria that would push him to vote in favor of the plan: Whether it protected people with preexisting conditions…

On May 11, Miami Rep. Carlos Curbelo wrote an op-ed in the Miami Herald defending the fact that he voted for the American Health Care Act (AHCA), the GOP bill to repeal Obamacare. Throughout 716 condescending words, Curbelo avoided discussing the fact that the new AHCA takes an $880 billion shark bite out of Medicaid funding for the poor and needy.

A note to U.S. Rep. Carlos Curbelo’s staff: Just stop letting him talk about health care. Earlier this month, the Miami Republican was one of the final swing votes that ensured the American Health Care Act (AHCA), which cripples Obamacare, passed on to the Senate. After his constituents excoriated him for trying to rip away their health care, he wrote a condescending, insulting, and lie-ridden op-ed in the Miami Herald calling his critics leftists and crybabies for asking for basic access to health insurance. That did not go over well.

Two South Florida congressmen are treating a vote to rip health care away from millions of Americans — the sort of thing that would kill people, including your grandparents and children — with the relative seriousness of choosing their dates for senior prom.

Florida’s House of Representatives proved today there is nothing its grubby little hands can’t screw up. After more than 72 percent of voters statewide voted to legalize medicinal marijuana for people with “debilitating diseases,” a term that includes cancer, AIDS, and Alzheimer’s, the Florida House today passed its own series of rules regulating the state’s new medical weed industry.

Floridians are suffering from an epidemic of head trauma.