A self-described conservative Republican from rural Ohio, Chris Albright stood beside the small stage at Freedom Corner in Pittsburgh’s Hill District on Saturday and listened carefully to an eight-minute speech delivered by U.S. Rep. Summer Lee, D-Swissvale, a progressive whose district includes the diverse neighborhoods of Pittsburgh.
Albright, wearing a faded hooded sweatshirt and a long gray beard, shoved his hands in his pockets but otherwise remained still. His dispassionate expression never changed. You had to wonder what he was thinking. Lee is a member of the Squad, the group of Democratic representatives who send lots of conservatives into a rage. When Lee finished speaking, she walked past Albright.
“Hey, I like you,” Albright said to her. “If I lived here, I’d vote for you.”
That’s the power of a discussion about health care these days. It’s one of those topics that will bring together people from a variety of backgrounds. The Pittsburgh event, which attracted about 75 activists, union members and everyday folks, was part of a national effort to put single-payer health care on the national agenda.
Albright drove in front East Palestine, Ohio. He told the crowd he developed severe heart problems in the aftermath of a 2023 toxic train derailment near his home. He couldn’t work, so he lost his health insurance. One of drugs keeping him alive costs $2,700 each month, a crushing amount for a working-class family.
“We were having utilities shut off,” Albright said. “We’re getting shut-off notices all the time. We’re robbing Peter to pay Paul, trying to get the medications I need. I’ve had some good people along the way help out, and without their help I would literally probably be dead right now.
“Something has to change,” he added. “We need to fix this. This is not how this country is supposed to be. We’re supposed to be united and caring and welcoming.”
Both Albright and Lee stressed that out-of-control health care costs are a concern for people across the political spectrum. That’s the appeal of single-payer health care. “This isn’t a liberal or a progressive proposal,” she said. “This is common sense.”
Lee reminded the crowd that the GOP’s “Big Beautiful Bill,” which has passed the U.S. House of Representatives and will be taken up by the Senate this week, takes the country in an entirely different direction.
“Right now, 3 million Pennsylvanians stand to lose Medicaid coverage,” she said. “Thinking about kids, adults with disabilities. Couple that with losses to SNAP benefits, and we’re looking at a crisis of people not only not being able to get care but not even being able to eat. And then couple that with the crisis of not being able to put a roof over our heads because of the housing crisis. We need Medicare for All today.”
Dr. Thomas Brockmeyer, one of the first speakers, is an orthopedic surgeon who developed blood cancer. After he retired in 2017, his insurance changed, and the co-pay for his chemotherapy leaped to $800 per month.
“We tightened our belts; we changed our retirement plans; and we carried on with my obscenely expensive treatment,” he said. Many other working-class families don’t have this option.
“Because of this conflict between spending money on chemo and spending money on food, medical debt is the largest cause of personal bankruptcy in our country,” he said. “In no other country is this true. No other country. This is a national disgrace.”
Health insurance companies spend $500 billion each year on executive salaries and shareholder profits, he said, and drug companies grow rich as Americans struggle with drug costs that are four times that of other developed countries. That money should instead be spent on providing care, Brockmeyer said.
Ed Grystar of the Western Pennsylvania Coalition for Single Payer Health Care noted that the United States remains “the only industrialized country with a private sector running the health care. And our lifespans have gone down five years less than every other industrialized country in the world.”
Claire Cohen, a child psychiatrist and member of Physicians for a National Health Program of Western PA, addressed the often-mentioned concern that single-payer health care will simply cost too much.
“So there’s two answers to that,” she said. “First of all, right now we’re paying for our expensive system through death, poor health and debt. If we had a single-payer health care system, we would have half the cost, and yet everybody would be covered equitably and with full and appropriate health care.”
Allegheny County Council member Dan Grzybek urged people to push for single-payer health care by reaching out to elected officials at the local, state and national levels. That’s the only way to counteract the vast amounts of money spent by the health care industry and big pharma.
“Don’t ever let them believe that the amount of money that they’re putting into our elections, that they’re putting into lobbying people, is stronger than your voice,” he said. “Because at the end of the day, your voice and your vote is always stronger.”
Steve is a photojournalist and writer for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, but he is currently on strike and working as a Union Progress co-editor. Reach him at [email protected].