Ted Cruz to the Sick: Drop Dead

Pressed on how exactly he planned to replace Obamacare during Thursday’s Republican debate, Ted Cruz offered a subtly callous answer that suggested he had no plans to guarantee health coverage for Americans with pre-existing conditions.

“I realize everyone opposes Obamacare and you’re not alone,” Fox News’ Bret Baier began. “But today there are millions of people who gained health insurance from Obamacare and they now rely on it. So the question, Sen. Cruz, if you repeal Obamacare, as you say you will: Will you be fine if millions of those people don’t have health insurance, and what is your specific plan for covering the uninsured?”

what’s missing: Any mention whatsoever of how patients with pre-existing conditions, who were routinely denied coverage by insurance companies prior to health reform, would be taken care of. Obamacare, of course, dealt with this issue by requiring insurers to cover everybody, while also requiring that every adult buy insurance so healthy customers could subsidize older, sicker ones and balance out the markets. Standard conservative alternatives to Obamacare have gone a separate route, proposing heavily subsidized “high-risk pools,” which amount to special insurance plans for the sick.

his isn’t the first time Cruz has outlined his principles on health care this way. It’s an oblique way of telling the sick to drop dead, and not much more.

More From Slate: