WASHINGTON: Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris announced a plan to expand healthcare benefits to cover at-home senior care in an interview on ABC’s “The View” program on October 8, the latest policy proposal in her effort to boost the “care economy” and lower healthcare costs.
Harris rolled out the proposal in the first of a series of media interviews she was slated to do in New York, as she and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump race to energise voters before the November 5 election.
The ABC show’s viewership is largely middle-aged and older women, the target audience for Harris’ promise to ease the burden of caring for children and ageing parents at the same time, sometimes referred to as the “sandwich generation.”
“I took care of my mother when she was sick. She was diagnosed with cancer,” Harris said, describing her personal experience with caregiving. “There are so many people in our country who are right in the middle.
They take care of their kids and they’re taking care of their ageing parents, and it’s just almost impossible to do it all,” she said. Harris’ policy would expand Medicare, the federal insurance plan for elderly and disabled people, to cover long-term care for seniors at home for the first time, including services like in-home health aides, in hopes of saving American families the often high cost of nursing homes for ageing family members.
The proposal would be funded by money saved from a new drug-price negotiation plan Biden introduced and by cracking down on hidden drug costs. Many policies echo his “Care Economy” proposals.
