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Pelosi Says Democrats to Unveil `Sweeping' Health Bill March 26

Backers of Medicare for All hope to build support among Democrats with the goal of making it central to the party’s 2020 platform.

Pelosi Says Democrats to Unveil `Sweeping' Health Bill March 26
Petros Giannikopoulos, co-founder and president of Driver Inc., left, points to aspects of a digital cell sample slide at the company’s laboratory in San Francisco, California, U.S. (Photographer: Michael Short/Bloomberg)

(Bloomberg) -- House Democrats plan to unveil health-care legislation on March 26 aimed at lowering costs and protecting people with pre-existing conditions, according to an advisory from the office of Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

The bill, broadly timed to coincide with the 9th anniversary this weekend of Obamacare being signed into law, would “reverse the Trump administration’s health-care sabotage, and take new measures to lower health premiums and out-of-pocket costs for families,” according to the statement.

The measure is set to be proposed as more than 100 Democrats in the House back a “Medicare for All” bill introduced in February by Progressive Caucus co-chair Representative Pramila Jayapal of Washington state. The legislation, which right now has no chance of becoming law in a divided Congress, would create a universal, single-payer health program. Pelosi and a number of party moderates have resisted the idea.

Backers of Medicare for All hope to build support among Democrats with the goal of eventually making it central to the party’s 2020 platform.

To contact the reporter on this story: Kim Chipman in Chicago at kchipman@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Kasia Klimasinska at kklimasinska@bloomberg.net, Ros Krasny, Kim Chipman

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