AP photo In the wealthiest nation in the world, many Americans struggle with health-care costs.

Patients at Roswell Park Cancer Institute are offered financial counseling to help them figure out how they are going to pay for their care. I was blessed with excellent health insurance coverage so I declined the counseling.

As the statements from Roswell and Highmark Blue Cross and Blue Shield started to arrive during my lengthy stay in hospital, I started to realize just how blessed my wife and I have been to have excellent health insurance paid for mostly by our employers. The insurance documents stating that this procedure cost this much and this drug cost that much started to quickly add up to a very large dollar amount. The cost of my cancer care quickly topped one million dollars. My out of pocket expenses were just a few thousand.

It’s hard for me to feel sorry for myself when I make one of my routine appointments at Roswell. A good friend of mine, who volunteers there, calls his weekly sessions at Roswell grounding. All you have to do is look around just a little bit and you will see people of all ages whose struggles make your own look like a walk in the park.

As I see some of these courageous cancer warriors, I can’t help but hope that they have some sort of health insurance. I don’t know how else anyone could pay for such expensive treatment.

According to Google and AI, two-thirds of all personal bankruptcies in the U.S. are linked to medical issues. And many of those bankruptcies are filed by people who have health insurance. It seems that every week there is a fundraiser advertised for a family in need of relief from medical bills or a Go Fund Me page for a cancer combatant.

In January 2025, I visited Roswell for a routine leukemia stem cell transplant follow up. I was so very upset when I was told that I couldn’t go home. I felt pretty good that day. I had driven myself to the hospital and I was lifting weights, albeit light weights, just that morning. There was no way that I needed to be hospitalized again. But after the good doctors at Roswell showed me the x-ray of the blood clots in my lungs and told me that I had pneumonia and a virus, I stopped arguing and started focusing on how soon I could get well and be discharged. I did everything I was told and I asked every day, “How soon can I go home?”.

About a week into my stay, one of the doctors told me that I was ready to go home but the drug that I was taking intravenously to fight the virus I had was expensive in pill form and the insurance company was presently unwilling to cover the cost of the pill form of the drug. When I asked how expensive the drug was in pill form the doctor told me it cost $200,000 for the necessary dosage.

I stated that I guess I was staying in hospital and on the IV until the virus was under control. The physician told me that my hospital bed had to be made available for more needy patients but not to worry. He was going to appeal to the insurance company and if they still wouldn’t cover the cost of the drug, we would figure it out.

He told me not to worry. But all I did for the next few days was worry about how I would pay for a $200,000 dosage of a drug without ruining my family financially. After a few unsettling days, the insurance company gave in to my doctor’s appeal and agreed to pay for the pill form of the drug. And while I no longer need this impossible to pronounce and insanely expensive drug, I still take a daily cocktail of drugs in pill form that amounts to tens of thousands of dollars.

As retirees, with two children under the age of 26 on a family health insurance plan, my wife and I currently pay more than $2,000 per month for insurance coverage. And although we have my social security benefits, our pensions and investments, $24,000 a year is still a heavy lift. I can’t imagine how a young family just starting out with a couple of kids, a mortgage, car payments, student loans and all the monthly bills that make up family life can afford $24K a year for health care.

When I was working as a teacher and a principal, on more than one occasion, I had someone comment to me that they wished they had my health insurance. I received quizzical looks when I would reply that I wished everyone had the excellent health insurance that I received. I have always been in favor of a health care model where the government fully funds health care services through taxpayer money, allowing citizens to access medical treatment without upfront costs.

Trillions of our tax dollars have been spent on foreign wars and on protecting NATO and other countries while our own country is being the policeman of the globe. And yet many of the countries that the U.S. protects have universal, tax funded healthcare, treating it as a public good like police or fire services. By policing the planet and covering other countries’ security costs, is the U.S. actually subsidizing their health care plans?

According to Google, even China has achieved 95% health insurance population coverage. And while the details of China’s health care system are sketchy and there are serious inequities in Chinese health care, more than 95% of Chinese citizens have some form of government funded health insurance. According to AI, approximately 92% of the people in the United States had health insurance at some point during the year 2024.That leaves 8% or 26 million Americans uninsured. And of the 92% insured, 66% were insured by private plans.

I would gladly pay in taxes the $2,000 a month health insurance premium that I pay, plus even a bit more in taxes, if it would fund a universal health care program for all U.S. citizens.

If we are really interested in Making America Healthy Again, shouldn’t it start with free or affordable health care for all? And if there really is an America First movement in this country, shouldn’t the healthcare of all U.S. citizens be paramount?

While on the campaign trail a decade ago, President Trump promised to repeal the Affordable Care Act (AKA “Obama Care”) and replace it with a better and more affordable option that would work for all Americans. Trump Care has been repeatedly said to be just a couple of weeks away. We have also heard that there are concepts of a health care plan just waiting to be implemented. I think that Trump’s promise of affordable health care for all U.S. citizens has gotten lost in the cacophony of the Epstein files, the Russia Ukraine war, ICE raids and invading Greenland. The list of distractions goes on and on.

It always amazes me when government employees who are provided with excellent health insurance by way of tax dollars cry out for the repeal of the ACA. I find it perplexing when seniors enjoying the benefits of Medicare speak out against “Obama Care.” And it is so disappointing to me when I hear church goers proudly proclaim that America is a Christian Nation and yet these same Christians are opposed to health care for all and want to see the ACA repealed. They seem to forget that the one thing that Christ did more than any other during His ministry was to heal the sick. Call it whatever you want, Affordable Care Act, Obama Care, Trump Care or Jesus Care.

All of the citizens of the greatest and wealthiest nation in the history of the world deserve affordable health care.

Andrew Ludwig is a retired math teacher and a retired public school and Catholic school administrator. He currently works as a substitute teacher in Chautauqua County.