KFF Health News and PolitiFact staffs
President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump, the presumptive Democratic and Republican presidential nominees, shared a debate stage June 27 for the primary time since 2020, in a confrontation that — due to strict debate guidelines — managed to keep away from the near-constant interruptions that marred their earlier encounters.
Biden, who spoke in a raspy voice and infrequently struggled to articulate his arguments, stated at one level that his administration “finally beat Medicare.” Trump, in the meantime, repeated quite a few falsehoods, together with that Democrats need docs to have the ability to abort infants after beginning.
Trump took credit score for the Supreme Court’s 2022 resolution that upended Roe v. Wade and returned abortion coverage to states. “This is what everybody wanted,” he stated, including “it’s been a great thing.” Biden’s response: “It’s been a terrible thing.”
In one notable second, Trump stated he wouldn’t repeal FDA approval for treatment abortion, used final 12 months in nearly two-thirds of U.S. abortions. Some conservatives have focused the FDA’s greater than 20-year-old approval of the drug mifepristone to additional prohibit entry to abortion nationwide.
“The Supreme Court just approved the abortion pill. And I agree with their decision to have done that, and I will not block it,” Trump stated. The Supreme Court dominated this month that an alliance of anti-abortion medical teams and docs lacked standing to problem the FDA’s approval of the drug. The court docket’s ruling, nevertheless, didn’t quantity to an approval of the drug.
CNN hosted the talk, which had no viewers, at its Atlanta headquarters. CNN anchors Jake Tapper and Dana Bash moderated. The debate format allowed CNN to mute candidates’ microphones when it wasn’t their flip to talk.
Our PolitiFact partners fact-checked the talk in actual time as Biden and Trump clashed on the financial system, immigration, and abortion, and revisited dialogue of their ages. Biden, 81, has change into the oldest sitting U.S. president; if Trump defeats him, he would finish his second time period at age 82. You can learn the full coverage here and excerpts detailing particular health-related claims observe:
Biden: “We brought down the price [of] prescription drug[s], which is a major issue for many people, to $15 for an insulin shot, as opposed to $400.”
Half True. Biden touted his efforts to scale back prescription drug prices by referring to the $35 month-to-month insulin worth cap his administration put in place as a part of the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. But he initially flubbed the quantity through the debate, saying it was lowered to $15. In his closing assertion, Biden corrected the quantity to $35.
The worth of insulin for Medicare enrollees, beginning in 2023, dropped to $35 a month, not $15. Drug pricing specialists instructed PolitiFact when it rated the same declare that the majority Medicare enrollees had been seemingly not paying a month-to-month common of $400 earlier than the adjustments, though as a result of prices fluctuate relying on protection phases and dosages, some may need paid that a lot in a given month.
Trump: “I’m the one that got the insulin down for the seniors.”
Mostly False. When he was president, Trump instituted the Part D Senior Savings Model, a program that capped insulin prices at $35 a month for some older Americans in taking part drug plans.
But as a result of it was voluntary, only 38% of all Medicare drug plans, together with Medicare Advantage plans, participated in 2022, in response to KFF. Trump’s plan additionally coated just one type of every dosage and insulin sort.
Biden factors to the Inflation Reduction Act’s necessary $35 month-to-month insulin cap as a serious achievement. This cap applies to all Medicare prescription plans and expanded to all coated insulin varieties and dosages. Although Trump’s mannequin was a begin, it didn’t have the sweeping attain that Biden’s necessary cap achieved.
Biden: Trump “wants to get rid of the ACA again.”
Half True. In 2016, Trump campaigned on a promise to repeal and exchange the Affordable Care Act, or ACA. In the White House, Trump supported a failed effort to just do that. He repeatedly stated he would dismantle the well being care regulation in marketing campaign stops and social media posts all through 2023. In March, nevertheless, Trump walked again this stance, writing on his Truth Social platform that he “isn’t running to terminate” the ACA however to make it “better” and “less expensive.” Trump hasn’t stated how he would do that. He has often promised Obamacare replacement plans with out ever producing one.
Trump: “The problem [Democrats] have is they’re radical, because they will take the life of a child in the eighth month, the ninth month, and even after birth.”
False. Willfully terminating a new child’s life is infanticide and unlawful in each U.S. state.
Most elected Democrats who’ve spoken publicly about this have stated they help abortion beneath Roe v. Wade’s normal, which allowed entry as much as fetal viability — sometimes round 24 weeks of being pregnant, when the fetus can survive exterior the womb. Many Democrats have additionally stated they help abortions previous this level if the treating doctor deems it crucial.
Medical specialists say conditions leading to fetal dying within the third trimester are uncommon — fewer than 1% of abortions within the U.S. happen after 21 weeks — and sometimes contain deadly fetal anomalies or life-threatening emergencies affecting the pregnant particular person. For fetuses with very quick life expectations, docs could induce labor and supply palliative care. Some households select this feature when going through diagnoses that restrict their infants’ survival to minutes or days after supply.
Some Republicans who’ve made claims much like Trump’s level to Democratic help of the Women’s Health Protection Act of 2022, which might have prohibited many state authorities restrictions on entry to abortion, citing the invoice’s provisions that say suppliers and sufferers have the proper to carry out and obtain abortion companies with out sure limitations or necessities that might impede entry. Anti-abortion advocates say the invoice, which failed within the Senate by a 49-51 vote, would have created a loophole that eradicated any limits on abortions later in being pregnant.
Alina Salganicoff, director of KFF’s Women’s Health Policy program, stated the laws would have allowed well being suppliers to carry out abortions with out obstacles resembling ready durations, medically pointless checks and in-person visits, or different restrictions. The invoice would have allowed an abortion after viability when, in response to the invoice, “in the good-faith medical judgment of the treating health care provider, continuation of the pregnancy would pose a risk to the pregnant patient’s life or health.”
Trump: “Social Security, he’s destroying it, because millions of people are pouring into our country, and they’re putting them onto Social Security. They’re putting them onto Medicare, Medicaid.”
False. It’s wrong to say that immigration will destroy Social Security. Social Security’s fiscal challenges stem from a scarcity of employees in contrast with beneficiaries.
Immigration is way from a fiscal fix-all for Social Security’s challenges. But having extra immigrants within the United States would seemingly improve the worker-to-beneficiary ratio, doubtlessly for many years, thus extending this system’s solvency.
Most immigrants within the U.S. with out authorized permission are additionally ineligible for Social Security. However, individuals who entered the U.S. with out authorization and had been granted humanitarian parole — short-term permission to remain within the nation — for a couple of 12 months are eligible for advantages from this system.
Immigrants missing authorized residency within the U.S. are usually ineligible to enroll in federally funded well being care protection resembling Medicare and Medicaid. (Some states provide Medicaid protection beneath state-funded programs no matter immigration standing. Immigrants are eligible for emergency Medicaid no matter their authorized standing.)