Thread by @oni_blackstock

This is necropolitics.

Mississippi, a state which ranks among the lowest in health indicators & among the highest in poverty rates, is refusing to accept $1.35 billion in Medicaid dollars to cover medical care.

This is also a state with a largest % of Black residents in the US.

Necropolitics = “necropolitics as “the capacity to define who matters and who does not, who is disposable and who is not…

[It] is a framework that illuminates how governments assign differential value to human life.”

teenvogue.com/story/what-is-…

Of note, Medicaid has expansion has led to a cross-section of health-related benefits for people in those states which adopted expansion.

“In a 2021 analysis, researchers for the National Bureau of Economic Research estimated that in one four-year period, 19,200 more adults…”

“… aged 55 to 64 survived because of expanded coverage, and nearly 16,000 more would have lived if that coverage was nationwide.

Other studies suggest why: Making medical care more affordable led to increases in regular checkups, cancer screenings,…”

“diagnoses of chronic diseases and prescriptions for needed medicines.”

In other words, not accepted Medicaid dollars to expand Medicaid is a death-making policy decision.