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I didn’t expect to care this much about health policy while I was in college. But the more I deal with insurance, whether it’s navigating my own coverage or trying to help family members figure theirs out, the more I realize how broken parts of the system are.
Right now, there’s a lot of focus in Washington on different ways to lower costs. That’s important. But from where I sit, insurance reform feels like the piece that gets overlooked, and it probably matters the most.
Even with coverage, people still face high deductibles, confusing rules, and sudden changes in what’s covered. It’s really frustrating, but maybe more importantly, it means that people often delay their access to care. I think we all know someone who has second guessed whether they can actually afford to follow through on what their doctor recommended.
For students and young adults in Maine, that uncertainty is becoming normal. And it shouldn’t be.
I really think that if policymakers are serious about affordability, they need to take a much closer look at how insurance works in practice. Because right now, having insurance doesn’t always mean having access.
That’s a problem I think Mainers deserve to have fixed first.
Austin Seavey
Dover-Foxcroft