When Sen. Andy Kim introduced a bill to give all children health insurance — the way we give all seniors health insurance — it didn’t take long for newly minted critics to start screaming about socialism.
So it’s worth restating the facts here.
➡️ FACT: Insuring Babies Will Save the U.S. Money: The MediKids Act (S. 5037), introduced by Sen. Kim and endorsed by First Focus Campaign for Children and nearly two dozen other national, state, and local organizations, would guarantee free, high-quality health care to every child in America from birth to age 26. One of its most important components is the extension of the Early and Periodic Screening, Diagnostic, and Treatment (EPSDT) benefit to all children at birth. This gold-standard care for babies focuses on prevention by providing routine screening that heads off problems before they grow. Studies have shown that every $1 spent on children’s health care saves the government $4 down the road.
➡️ FACT: Kids Are Currently Losing Insurance: Roughly 4.7 million U.S. children were without health insurance in 2024, according to the Census, a number that has grown since President Trump took office. At least 2 million fewer children are enrolled in Medicaid since January 2025.
➡️ FACT: Medicaid Gives Children Excellent Health Care: Kids are not just little adults. Medicaid is specifically designed for kids in ways that employer-based health care programs, even top-of-the-line plans held by wealthy families, are not (see EPSDT above).
➡️ FACT: We Need to Fix Access to Medicaid: Families have a difficult time accessing Medicaid — a problem that will only get worse as the $1 trillion cuts and new work reporting requirements imposed by H.R. 1 take full effect. This is not a reason to dismiss the program, but instead, to address these issues.
➡️ FACT: MediKids = Medicare, but for Kids: MediKids is less like the U.K.’s admittedly flawed national health care system and more like…Medicare. As First Focus on Children President Bruce Lesley notes at Kids Can’t Wait, Medicare “has focused on covering every American who is 65-and-older for the last 61 years…and hasn’t collapsed into rationed, NHS-style care.”
➡️ FACT: TIME IS RUNNING OUT: We can quibble over which vehicle is best suited to ensuring that every child in this country has health care. But no one can credibly argue that we can wait any longer to do it.