A.G. Gancarski
Jacksonville Mayor Donna Deegan is taking a victory lap in the wake of a campaign to get more of her city’s residents health insurance.
When the Get Covered Jax campaign was begun last fall, roughly 120,000 locals lacked coverage. But now that it’s over, 40,726 people who didn’t have coverage now do.
“I am thrilled that Get Covered Jax! was so successful,” Deegan said.
“I often say that a confused mind says ‘no,’ and this campaign provided important information for our citizens so they could say ‘yes’ to enrolling in health insurance. I want Jacksonville to be a healthier city because health, both physical and mental, is key to our economic prosperity. And the fact that Get Covered Jax! helped reduce our uninsured rate by 34% is a tremendous first step in helping us get there. I look forward to reducing this rate even further during the next open enrollment period.”
Deegan’s choice for the city’s first Chief Health Officer, Sunil Joshi, made similar points.
“More people will now have access to preventative health services including yearly physical exams, blood work, vaccinations and cancer screening that can help keep people healthy,” Joshi said
“It is very encouraging to see so many people take advantage of signing up for marketplace insurance. This is just the beginning of our road to being one of the healthiest communities in the country.”
Improving local health outcomes has been a priority of Jacksonville Mayors for some years now, even before Deegan was elected.
Former Mayor Lenny Curry launched in his first term a “Journey to One” campaign, which included a call for “monthly mayorthons,” to challenge locals to walk, run, or step master 26.2 miles a month with the goal of locals losing a million pounds: about a pound per resident.
But that campaign didn’t meaningfully improve health outcomes. Duval County performs worse than the average county in Florida and the average county in the United States, with more smoking, obesity, excessive drinking, sexually transmitted diseases and physical inactivity.
Unlike Deegan, Curry didn’t push signing up for Affordable Health Care Act insurance plans for locals.
While it’s yet unknown whether more insurance access will lead to better health, Deegan’s progress on that front could be a positive for local outcomes.
11 comments
Julia
April 2, 2024 at 5:30 pm
Anybody may work from home a part-time employment at any time. You can select the price that best suits your requirements. It need to be simple to understand, especially for non-techies. Authenticity reduces costs, boosts success rates, and vx10 enhances readiness.
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Hung Wiil
April 2, 2024 at 5:42 pm
Congratulations Mayor Deegan for the success in reducing uninsured rates in your city. Why doesn’t this article provide and description of the Get Covered Jax program? What was the campaign? How did it get people covered?
It just seems to be obvious that you would provide a description of the programs’ specifics.
Earl Pitts "THE NEW MAYOR OF REALVILLE" American
April 2, 2024 at 6:18 pm
Your right my friend Hung,
Donna’s a good fit for Jacksonville.
Just because I’m a little bit disapointed in the Duvall Slacker RINO Party’s leadership for not following Earl’s Sage advice does not mean I dislike Donna.
Sometimes Earl just has to call a group of Slackers or RINO’s out Publically when they fail their constituants as blaintally as the Duval RINO Leadership did. Do Better next time Duvall Republicans.
Looking good and freash Donna,
Earl Pitts American
MH/Duuuval
April 2, 2024 at 7:46 pm
“Unlike Deegan, Curry didn’t push signing up for Affordable Health Care Act insurance plans for locals.”
I would have placed this info at the beginning of the story, but it was AG’s to write.
Old geezer
April 3, 2024 at 1:17 am
There’s a live link to the program page and the article describes it was an initiative to get people on ACA marketplace insurance. No fawning description because it was a city driven PR initiative to take advantage of the federal program.
MH/Duuuval
April 3, 2024 at 10:55 am
Today’s Times-Union has a story by David Bauerlein that reports this program focused on getting out the word on Obamacare — and the steep increase of those becoming insured that resulted in Duval.
I don’t know about the “fawning” since partisanship is the daily regimen these days, but the MAGAs have at every step tried to diminish what has become a program of broad interest.
Above all, the program works to keep people out of the emergency room by making preventive care available.
MH/Duuuval
April 4, 2024 at 10:42 pm
Literate and alert old geezer …
the Truth
April 2, 2024 at 8:19 pm
Deegan is a one term Mayor, she does not have much intelligence
Facts
April 3, 2024 at 1:34 am
Beware of one termers with nothing to lose. They will bankrupt the city in less than 4 years now it’s going on with pension, billionaire welfare stadium which public pays for but only benefits the billionaire and the franchise, paying people who make over $120k to buy a house in Jax each $25k free cash (not loan) paid out of the general budget fund even though there is a generous state funded program for loans and down payment assistance (look it up), billion++ dollar jail, and no attention to neighborhood infrastructure in hardest hit areas like promised, neighborhoods still flood every time it rains because they won’t fix the drainage, streets a mess, crime is up, too many speeding drunks in our neighborhood which used to be lovely and quiet. All that money for emerald trail while basics in the city go unaddressed and unfunded. And they’ll just build right over and ignore the problems. People getting pushed out of their homes and more headwinds to come. They want to borrow billions in this economic environment and it will crush 2-3 generations and prevent fixing or addressing literally everything they promised and for years to come. With no financial or business experience, city hall is like a mean girls clique and doesn’t know how to use a calculator and has seriously pissed off FOP. One term is enough.
MH/Duuuval
April 3, 2024 at 11:03 am
Deegan may well be a one-term Mayor, but the legacy of Lenny Curry, with all his accounting degrees and political experience, demonstrates that listening to what people say is better for governance than imposing a top-down form of governing. JEA?!
As for the “pissed off” FOP, they got shafted by Lenny who took away the pensions for new hires. The FOP leadership rolled over for that travesty and remain loyal to MAGAland.
Donna has proffered putting the police into the state retirement fund. The FOP rank and file needs to listen to what she is saying and try to work with her, instead of standing by while their leadership insists that MAGAs will take care of them BECAUSE THEY DIDN’T.
Facts
April 6, 2024 at 4:54 pm
My current frustrations with the current administration, which I initially supported and now do not trust, do not equate to propping up the previous administration. Except pension reform had to happen if the city was to avoid going the way of other failing cities who spend over half their entire budgets on pension, which Duval is approaching. That was a success story even though no one was happy. The state pension fund has some serious issues right now too, mainly due to how it’s been raided and mismanaged for the last decade, maybe more. That doesn’t mean it can’t be helped or fixed. But that power would not be coming from Duval and FOP would be fools to buy into the idea that they would be taken care of given the current dynamics. MAGA will eat their own and cut off their nose to spite their face in order to take care of the top vultures. Meanwhile the city cannot afford to go back to the old pension. Not with all the other drunken spending and bloated obligations it just seems bent on. Hmm.
I want Deegan to live up to her promise to put neighborhoods and citizens and the city first and not be a repeat of cronyism albeit in different form with different wrapping. But Jax always feels like same stuff different day. The faces change but the dynamics do not. I am concerned what we will get out of this mayoral term is a hugely expanded budget (again), billionaire welfare, unfulfilled neighborhood promises, crushing multi generational debt, a lower municipal bond rating, higher taxes to pay for crony sponsorship development (not actual organically funded growth), but it’s ok because it’s all hearts and flowers. Right. I hope I am wrong. I want to be wrong. I would like to replace the entire city council as well.
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