Norton Works with Black Caucus to Encourage African American Men to Enroll in Health Insurance, Before Deadline

WASHINGTON, DC – Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC), co-chair of the Congressional Caucus on Black Men and Boys, is leading a week-long initiative with Caucus co-chair Danny Davis (D-IL) and Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) chair Marcia Fudge to encourage African Americans, with a special focus on African American men, to sign up for health insurance before the March 31, 2014 deadline. CBC members have stressed the benefits of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) for all Americans. The special focus to get African American men to sign up for health insurance at healthcare.gov or through their local exchange before the March deadline is because they are the demographic with the lowest enrollment, despite their high asthma, diabetes, hypertension, cardiovascular, and HIV rates. At today’s CBC meeting, CBC men stood for a group picture holding a poster featuring the hashtag #GetCovered (see group picture below). Continuing to the March 31 deadline, members of the CBC will be tweeting using the hashtag #BlackMenEnroll, and tweeting individual pictures of themselves holding a poster with that hashtag (see Norton picture below). The Congresswoman is encouraging members of the public and the media to keep an eye out for these pictures, tweets and hashtags on social media, and to continue the discussion through social media. People can also print a #BlackMenEnroll sign and tweet a picture of themselves with the sign. The sign is available through the CBC website at https://cbc.fudge.house.gov/uploads/BlackMenEnroll_Share.pdf.

Published: March 26, 2014