Health care a political football
Affordable Care Act in the U.S. could be overturned, leaving athletes with lifelong medical bills, Kevin B. Blackistone writes.
Dak Prescott is among the fortunate ones. Alex Smith, too. If the horrific injuries they have suffered in the NFL lead to long-term physical ailments after their careers are done, they should be able to afford whatever comfort health care can provide.
For too many in the U.S. — even for some professional athletes — health care is an issue of affordability, not availability. Prescott was playing for US$31.4 million this season before suffering a compound ankle fracture. Smith returned this year from a compound leg break for a $16-million paycheque.
But the majority of their teammates and opponents won't earn nearly as much — in their entire careers. They won't play as long, either. This was Prescott's fifth season; Smith's in his 16th. The average career for an NFL player is around three seasons. Those who don't make it that far also fail to get vested in the players' union. So they're nearly on their own if they suffer damage that lingers forever. And they will.
As DeMaurice Smith told a CBS News audience on the morning of the Super Bowl in 2017, “We have a 100 per cent injury rate in the National Football League. And so every player leaves the National Football League with a pre-existing condition.”
Smith, executive director of the NFL Players Association, was responding to a question on Face the Nation about President Donald Trump's overtures to end the Obama administration's Affordable Care Act, whose most popular provision forbids insurers from refusing coverage for consumers with health problems from their past. As football players deal with a slew of such conditions, Smith made clear his membership was worried.
That was then. By Tuesday, Smith's concern should be a reality. On Monday night, the Senate confirmed Amy Coney Barrett, a favourite of social conservatives, to replace Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a hero of progressives, on the Supreme Court. One of the first major issues on which she could leave an imprint is the fate of the ACA.
This is why athletes should be political. They shouldn't forget that they play for owners who have donated mostly to the very Republican politicians who backed the right-leaning imbalance Barrett is expected to bring to the court.