Two candidates are playing a role in the GOP push to take control of the U.S. Senate and potentially hamper the further implementation of the Affordable Care Act – and they’re both doctors.
Rep. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) is a physician and congressman who is giving incumbent Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) the fight of her career. And in Oregon, Dr. Monica Wehby, a pediatric neurosurgeon, is challenging Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), though she still trails by double digits in the polls.
Rep. Bill Cassidy (R-La)
Both Dr. Wehby and Rep. Cassidy have made their opposition to the Affordable Care Act (ACA) a major component of their campaigns.
Rep. Cassidy, whose wife Laura is also a physician, favors a system that focuses on consumer-driven options such as health savings accounts, as well as moving forward on medical liability reform.
Dr. Wehby, who wants to repeal and replace the ACA, has also called for a federal investigation of the Cover Oregon insurance marketplace.
“It’s not brain surgery; Obamacare is bad for Oregon,” Dr. Wehby said in one of her political ads, which features footage of her in the hospital.
All U.S. Senate races are getting close attention this year because the upper chamber is so closely divided. The GOP needs a net gain of only 6 seats to win control.
Dr. Steve Shogan, a neurosurgeon from Denver, seeks one of Colorado’s Senate seats as an independent, though he’s not considered a contender in the race. Dr. Shogan has also been critical of the ACA, but says that he would prefer to replace it with a two-tiered approach that combines government-provided basic health care coverage with supplemental private insurance.
Several other doctors – mostly Republicans – lost primary bids for the Senate earlier this year.
But while the Senate is getting a lot of attention, there are plenty of physicians who are vying for seats in the House this year. At least 6 doctors are looking to become first-time lawmakers, and another 13 physicians are seeking reelection to the House, according to the American Medical Association.
Currently there are 20 physicians serving in Congress, including 4 Democrats and 16 Republicans.
While the physician candidates come from both parties, the majority are running as Republicans, and their platforms specifically call for repealing the ACA.
Dr. Jane Orient, an internist and executive director of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, said that she isn’t surprised. Not only do most physicians tend to be conservative, she said, but frustration with the ACA and other health care regulations is bubbling over.
“Physicians are seeing that their profession is being destroyed,” she said. “If they don’t fight for our rights to practice medicine according to our best judgment and according to our professional ethics, and without constantly being clerks for the third-party payers and the government, then we really have to get politically active.”
The ACA has prompted more physicians to get engaged in politics this year, according to Mark A. Peterson, Ph.D., professor of public policy and political science at the University of California, Los Angeles. While Dr. Peterson said that he agrees that most physicians identify with the Republican party, he added that there are still plenty of physicians who favor the ACA or even single-payer approaches, but they seem to have largely stayed out of politics.
“I don’t know why more of them haven’t taken up the charge to run for office, but it certainly didn’t help Democrats in recruitment that 2014 has been long perceived as a Republican year,” he said.
mschneider@frontlinemedcom.com
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