Jim Shella: Sen. Ernst is wrong about Medicaid. I personally know.

Iowa Sen. Joni Ernst recently made headlines for defending anticipated cuts in Medicaid funding that will result from the Republican budget bill, if passed. Millions of people might lose coverage. When a constituent at a town hall meeting shouted, “People will die!”, the Republican senator responded by saying, “We all are going to die.”

She followed up with a video on social media that mocked that constituent, saying, “I’m really, really glad I didn’t have to bring up the subject of the tooth fairy, as well.”

It became national news, but it caught my attention because my 47-year-old daughter Katie was dropped from Medicaid coverage in March. She died in April. My column didn’t appear in this space a month ago because I was busy writing a eulogy for her.

To be accurate, there might have been no direct link between the change in coverage and her death. Katie was on Social Security disability for about 12 years and maintained Medicare coverage even after Medicaid went away. She died after she chose to end treatment for chronic illnesses that had become acute.

Nevertheless, some of that treatment did change after she lost Medicaid, which provides superior coverage. And I am certain that, before her final hospitalization, her life was extended due to services covered by Medicaid. It definitely improved the quality of her final years of life.

And that’s the point that seems to evade Ernst. We will all die, but health care coverage and the level of health care can be a determining factor in when we die and how much we enjoy that life. There is irony in the fact that pro-life Republicans are unwilling to defend even portions of some lives when it doesn’t suit them politically.

There is further irony in the fact that the GOP tried to defeat Obamacare by pointing out that an early version of the Affordable Care Act contained provisions that called for end-of-life counseling for Medicare recipients. Sarah Palin famously declared inaccurately that “death panels” would decide who would live and who would die. Politifact labeled that comment the “Lie of the Year” for 2009. Now we have Ernst suggesting that bean counters will make those decisions without the benefit of a panel of any kind.

I have experience in this area because, as some of you know, loss has visited my doorstep before. My son Andy died in 2010, and my sister Sarah, who was 10 years younger than I, died three weeks later. My first wife, Connie, died in 2019. I’ve become fond of telling people that I know life’s not fair; what I don’t understand is why I need so many reminders.

Some friends have compared me to the biblical figure Job. But he lost 10 children in a day. My trials don’t compare. Still, I speak as someone who knows life is valuable and that it can easily slip away.

My advice to others who suffer loss is that life goes on. It’s a cliché, maybe, but three years ago, I got married again and my new wife, Pat, has three grandchildren who now bring adventures to my life that I never would have experienced otherwise.

And that’s why, after the last hymn was played at my daughter’s funeral, I asked for a little lighter tune. We played the Monty Python song “Always Look on the Bright Side of Life.” “If life seems jolly rotten, there’s something you’ve forgotten.” That was Katie’s approach. Be like her.

Don’t be like Joni Ernst.•

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Shella hosted WFYI’s “Indiana Week in Review” for 25 years and covered Indiana politics for WISH-TV for more than three decades. Send comments to [email protected].

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