The public option might be fizzling. The left is OK with that.

Progressives have rallied behind abolishing private insurance to set up a "Medicare for All" system, and some see a public option as undermining their cause, rather than a stepping stone to single payer. Many on the left, including Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and the Congressional Progressive Caucus, are coalescing around lowering the Medicare eligibility age below 65 and broadening the program’s benefits to include vision, dental and hearing. There are efforts in Congress to include such a provision in Biden’s infrastructure and jobs plan. “During the Democratic presidential primaries, a public option emerged as the anti-Medicare for All approach,” Larry Levitt, executive vice president for health policy at the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation, said. “It’s difficult for Medicare for All advocates to now pivot and get behind a public option. That effectively left the public option with no natural political constituency.”
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