| Health Care |
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 It is unacceptable that almost 50 million Americans do not have health insurance - nearly two million in Illinois. I will continue to fight for a health care system that is affordable and accessible to all Americans. To do this we need to lower health care costs. We must make significant investments in health information technology, prevention, and care coordination.Throughout my tenure in Congress, I have been a strong advocate for improving rural health care, and I will continue to be a proud member of the Rural Health Care Coalition (RHCC). The RHCC is a bi-partisan coalition committed to advancing rural priorities in health care policy. Since it was established, the RHCC successfully created the Office of Rural Health Policy within the Department of Health and Human Services, and the Critical Access Hospital program. I have also consistently supported legislation to expand the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) to cover 11 million children across the country. The program currently provides health insurance for more than 7 million children. This legislation will protect coverage for those children and expand it to include an additional 4 million children who would otherwise be uninsured. |