To the Editor:
Next week, the Connecticut General Assembly will be conducting a special session to pass several important bills, notably those regarding healthcare issues such as expanding telehealth and capping insulin prices.
During the pandemic, it is both more important and more risky than ever to have access to medical care. Those who need doctor visits the most, like the elderly, may have the most to lose by visiting a doctor’s office in person.
Those in rural areas may have trouble easily accessing a doctor at all. Our legislature needs to expand access to telehealth, or online doctor consultations, for this reason. It would allow high-risk as well as rural individuals to receive the healthcare they need without putting themselves and others at risk.
The other healthcare-related bill in question, an insulin price cap, is also desperately needed. The United States’ insulin costs are astronomical––averaging $360 a month compared to $112 in India, the next most expensive country, and nothing at all in many European countries.
The bill, if passed, would limit the cost of insulin and other diabetes supplies to $100 a month. If our legislature passes this bill, it would make Connecticut the most affordable state for insulin in America, and would unburden the hundreds of thousands of diabetics paying hundreds of dollars a month just to live.
Kylie Race
Westport
