On the heels of the Congressional Budget Office report projecting 22 million people could lose health insurance if the Senate’s version of Trumpcare becomes law, a new analysis published in the Annals of Internal Medicine (AIM) suggests the legislation could cause the deaths of thousands of people per year.

“People will die… It’s not hyperbole. The numbers don’t lie.”
—Karine Jean-Pierre, MoveOn.org

The study, authored by Steffie Woolhandler, MD, MPH, and David Himmelstein, MD, bases its conclusion on a comprehensive review of previous literature linking lack of health insurance to increased mortality rates.

The consequences of passing the Senate’s plan—which would gut Medicaid over the long-term while lavishing America’s wealthiest households with tax cuts—could be devastating, the review found.

Buzzfeed summarized:

“Being uninsured is deadly,” Woolhandler told Reuters in an interview. “That was the conclusion from a 2002 Institute of Medicine report. The evidence that’s accumulated over the last 15 years actually strengthens the Institute of Medicine’s conclusions.”