2 — Thursday, March 26, 2020
News
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
U.S. Rep. Debbie Dingell, D-Mich.,
held her third telephone town hall on
Wednesday to answer questions from
constituents regarding the most recent
developments on the coronavirus,
including the relief package that was
negotiated by the U.S. Senate earlier
that day and passed Wednesday
night, and the resources available to
constituents in District 12.
Congress has already passed two
smaller coronavirus bills to help
bolster the economy, but the third is a
nearly $2 trillion package that aims to
help stabilize the U.S. economy in the
months to come.
Dingell talked with constituents
alongside
Carolyn
Wilson,
chief
operating officer and executive vice
president at Beaumont Health, and
Romy Ancog, the regional export
finance manager at the Small Business
Administration in Detroit.
Dingell opened by emphasizing the
importance of staying home and how
everyone is needed to help stop the
spread of the coronavirus.
“This is real and diligence on the
part of everyone is needed right now,
and this is not a partisan time,” Dingell
said. “The number one priority besides
PPE (personal protective equipment) is
to address this health crisis. It requires
a Marshall Plan that we have to keep
our health care infrastructure strong,
and we are going to have to rebuild it to
ensure that the resources are there to
test and treat everyone who needs it.”
Wilson noted that many cases of
COVID-19 are mild, and symptoms —
which can include fever, fatigue and
dry cough — can often be managed
without seeking medical care.
“Most people do very well with their
management of these symptoms at
home,” Wilson said. “There is a minority
of patients who do require intervention
if those symptoms get moderate or
severe and we would encourage you if
you do have mild symptoms to stay at
home and quarantined as the governor
has asked us to do.”
Ancog discussed the focus of the
SBA during this time and encouraged
small business and nonprofit owners to
apply for loans.
“(We are focused on) how it can
help business owners get through
this very difficult time,” Ancog said.
“These loans are available for any small
business or nonprofit whether it was
affected directly or indirectly by this
virus.”
Dingell also acknowledged the need
to “flatten the curve,” or slow the
spread of the virus enough to ensure the
nation’s hospitals are not overwhelmed.
“If we’re going to take the peak and
lower it, we have to get to a hump and
that means we have to stop going out
and it’s really hard, but we have to do
that,” Dingell said.
“The bill that we hopefully will get
more details on tonight — Schumer
called it unemployment on steroids —
part of it is going to try to fully replace
wages for four months.”
SARAH PAYNE
Daily Staff Reporter
The Michigan Daily (ISSN 0745-967) is published Monday through Friday during
the fall and winter terms by students at the University OF Michigan. One copy is
available free of charge to all readers. Additional copies may be picked up at the
Daily’s office for $2. Subscriptions for September-April are $250 and year long
subscriptions are $275. University affiliates are subject to a reduced subscription
rate. On-campus subscriptions for fall term are $35. Subscriptions must be prepaid.
ERIN WHITE
Managing Editor
ekwhite@michigandaily.com
SAYALI AMIN and LEAH GRAHAM
Managing News Editors news@michigandaily.com
Senior News Editors: Barbara Collins, Claire Hao, Alex Harring, Ben Rosenfeld,
Emma Stein, Liat Weinstein
Assistant News Editors: Francesca Duong, Julia Forrest, Brayden Hirsh, Jasmin
Lee, Hannah Mackay, Parnia Mazhar, Alyssa McMurtry, Emma Ruberg, Julia
Rubin, Michal Ruprecht, Arjun Thakkar
EMILY CONSIDINE and MILES STEPHENSON
Editorial Page Editors tothedaily@michigandaily.com
Senior Opinion Editors: Alanna Berger, Brittany Bowman, Zack Blumberg,
Timothy Spurlin, Joel Weiner
JOHN DECKER and JULIANNA MORANO
Managing Arts Editors
arts@michigandaily.com
ALLISON ENGKVIST and ANNIE KLUSENDORF
Managing Photo Editors photo@michigandaily.com
MAGDALENA MIHAYLOVA
Managing Statement Editor statement@michigandaily.com
Deputy Editors: Emily Stillman, Marisa Wright
MADISON GAGNE and SADIA JIBAN
Managing Copy Editors copydesk@michigandaily.com
Senior Copy Editors: Olivia Bradish, Sophie Kephart, Silas Lee, Olivia Sedlacek,
Ellie Scott
TIM CHO and SIMRAN PUJJI
Managing Online Editors
webteam@michigandaily.com
Senior Web Developers: Parth Dhyani, Abha Panda, Rohan Prashant, Jonathan
Liu
ALEC COHEN and ELI SIDER
Managing Video Editors video@michigandaily.com
Senior Michigan in Color Editors: Zoha Bharwani, Lora Faraj, Ayomide
Okunade, Gabrijela Skoko
Assistant Michigan in Color Editors: Cheryn Hong, Anamkia Kannan, Vaishali
Nambiar, Sean Tran, Angela Zhang
Senior Sports Editors: Aria Gerson, Bailey Johnson, Ben Katz, Jacob Kopnick,
Anna Marcus, Rian Ratnavale
Assistant Sports Editors: Connor Brennan, Lily Friedman, Lane Kizziah,
Brendan Roose, Kent Schwartz, Molly Shea
Senior Video Editors: Joseph Sim
Senior Social Media Editors: Jessie Norris, Mya Steir, Kristina Zheng
Stanford Lipsey Student Publications Building
420 Maynard St.
Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1327
www.michigandaily.com
ARTS SECTION
arts@michigandaily.com
SPORTS SECTION
sports@michigandaily.com
ADVERTISING
dailydisplay@gmail.com
NEWS TIPS
news@michigandaily.com
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
tothedaily@michigandaily.com
EDITORIAL PAGE
opinion@michigandaily.com
ANITA MICHAUD
Business Manager
734-418-4115 ext. 1241
ammichau@michigandaily.com
ELIZABETH LAWRENCE
Editor in Chief
734-418-4115 ext. 1251
esla@michigandaily.com
PHOTOGRAPHY SECTION
photo@michigandaily.com
NEWSROOM
734-418-4115 opt. 3
CORRECTIONS
corrections@michigandaily.com
THEO MACKIE and ETHAN SEARS
Managing Sports Editors sportseditors@michigandaily.com
Senior Arts Editors: Jo Chang, Elise Godfryd, Zoe Phillips, Jonah Mendelson,
Ally Owens
Arts Beat Editors: Samantha Cantie, Dana Pierangeli, Andrew Pluta, Cassandra
Mansuetti, Anish Tamhaney, Sophia Yoon
SHERRY CHEN and CHRISTINE JEGARL
Managing Design Editors
design@michigandaily.com
Senior Design Editor: Lizzy Rueppel
MAYA MOKH and ANA MARIA SANCHEZ CASTILLO
Michigan in Color Editors michiganincolor@michigandaily.com
JOHN GRIEVE and BEN KORN
Managing Social Media Editors
Editorial Staff
Business Staff
Senior Photo Editors: Keemya Esmael, Asha Lewis, Miles Macklin
Assistant Photo Editors: Olivia Cell, Ryan Little, Emma Mati, Alexandria
Pompei, Alexis Rankin
MOLLY WU
Creative Director
SAMANTHA SMALL and SONYA VOGEL
Managing Podcast Editors
RYAN KELLY
Sales Manager
LILLY HANSON
Senior Account Executive
ANALISE DOORHY
Senior Account Executive
TARA MOORE
Senior Account Exeucutive
DOMINICK SOKOTOFF/Daily
Representative Debbie Dingell held her third telephone town hall Wednesday evening. This photo was taken when Dingell previously spoke with sup-
porters to kick off the Michigan Democratic Jewish Caucus at the Pretzel Bell in February.
Dingell provides updates on
federal response to COVID-19
US representative hosts telephone town hall to discuss efforts to stop
spread of virus, tells constituents ‘We cannot have a panic right now’
Now, the spread of coronavirus
and growing concerns about how the
nation’s hospitals will handle the strain
have fueled calls for Medicare for All
among some activists and politicians.
According to El-Sayed, one of the
primary goals of passing Medicare for
All is to prevent catastrophes like the
COVID-19 pandemic from causing
damage on a national level.
“Our responsibility is to articulate
the future that is set in the past we
wish we had,” El-Sayed said. “One
where we had been able to address
this, one where we could have been
able to stop this.”
El-Sayed, an alum of the University
of
Michigan
and
former
health
director of Detroit, is a prominent
proponent of universal health care,
has discussed Medicare for All widely
in various interviews, podcasts and in
his upcoming book “Healing Politics: A
Doctor’s Journey into the Heart of Our
Political Epidemic.” He is a longtime
proponent of the policy. During his
2018
gubernatorial
campaign,
he
proposed
MichiCare,
single-payer
health insurance covering all Michigan
residents.
On Wednesday, El-Sayed outlined
the ways in which Medicare for All
would benefit Americans, pointing
to the failure of the nation’s current
health care system to adequately
respond to the outbreak of coronavirus.
“Whenever you have a public good,
if you run the public good poorly, it’s
poor,” El-Sayed said. ”If you defund
the public good, it’s bad. I don’t want
folks to fall for the trick of ‘Oh look,
they’ve got a public system and look
how bad it’s failing.’ Well, we’re two
weeks away from seeing what the
consequences of our system are, and
it’s going to be awful. I wish we never
had to see it, but we’re going to see a lot
of these images.”
With respect to the COVID-19
pandemic, El-Sayed criticized the
current health care system’s handling
of the situation.
“Our
current
pandemic
is
substantially worse because there are
10 percent of people who are, in effect,
locked out of health care,” El-Sayed
said. “Coronavirus creates a very non-
specific set of symptoms. You know
how many other diseases cause a fever
and a dry cough? Almost everything
that people suffer from this time of
year. So if you’re sitting there, and even
if you have insurance but your health
care is behind a deductible, you’re
saying ‘Well look, alright, so I can get
tests paid for but if I don’t have COVID,
then I’m not going to get my care paid
for and I’m going to have to pay for it.
So maybe I just won’t.’”
See POLICY, Page 3
POLICY
From Page 1
Read more at
MichiganDaily.com