Frontline Healthcare Workers
Student Loan Forgiveness Program

The Concern

The COVID-19 Pandemic has made the invaluableness of our frontline healthcare workers and the need to take better care of them vividly clear.  We revere the ones who entertain us but have very little regard for the ones who take care of our basic needs - health, food, safety. It is a moral imperative that we change this way of thinking and turn our newfound gratitude into action. 

Our frontline healthcare providers are confronted with multiple challenges. Most are performing their jobs with minimal resources. As they continue to heal and save lives, many are faced with the concern of returning home and exposing their loved ones to the virus while others live apart from family members to ensure they don’t bring the virus home. 

With this class of personnel, we find that duty supplants safety, and the stress levels are similar to service members in a war zone. How can we as a society, do better for those who sacrifice so much, notwithstanding the current pandemic?

It is time that we do more than just say thank you. If tech companies such as Google, Netflix, and CISCO can offer their employees perks such as unlimited time off, free gourmet meals, free message credits, free fitness classes, free onsite classes for self-improvement and/or degree programs, surely we can provide more to those who put their lives on the line. With the role of healthcare workers being no less important than workers at these tech companies, let’s prove that we care for those who selflessly care for us. 

 

The Request

When this pandemic is over, at the very least, these workers should not have to worry about their student loans - the education vital to preserving the lives of many Americans.

We The People, therefore, petition ALL 535 voting members of Congress to pass legislation to direct the Department of Education to forgive 100% of student loans for all frontline healthcare workers - our nurses, doctors, phlebotomists, lab technicians, x-ray technicians, etc. This is just a small step forward, a gesture if you will, towards a broader discussion and proposed action plan for better benefits for all healthcare workers. Let’s make this bold move to show them how invaluable their service is as they continually put their lives on the line. 

 

Lest We Forget

Like service members who sacrificed in the military, history underscores why action is needed now; not promises for tomorrow. “It took the First World War for the United States to change the way it cares for veterans. Men returning from the war suffered from shell shock, the health effects of chemical warfare, and other ailments—and this time, the nation couldn’t bear to look away. From that point on, America’s veterans would benefit from a federally funded health care system.”*

Thus, “It would take centuries, and a tragic world war, to convince the United States to form a department that cared for its vets.”* This highlights the need to do something now for frontline healthcare personnel in this crisis, this war, this pandemic. Human nature proves that when the crisis is past the urgency wanes to honor those who sacrificed so much.

      The time to act is now!

"In history, a great volume is unrolled for our instruction, drawing the materials of future wisdom from the past errors and infirmities of mankind." --Edmund Burke

 

*"Pensions for Veterans Were Once Viewed as Government ...." 25 Apr. 2018, https://www.history.com/news/veterans-affairs-history-va-pension-facts Accessed 6 Apr. 2020.