Morrisey's health orders opposed; governor had hospital exec support in election

“We will eliminate the woke virus from our schools,� Morrisey pledged in his Jan. 13 address.

Eliminating the “woke virus,� Morrisey indicated moments later, partially meant “no more confusion about the differences between boys and girls.�

Morrisey followed up with a prescription in the form of an announcement at a news conference the next day that “men are men� and “women are women� and reporting a plan to work with the Legislature to “classify that under law.�

At that news conference, Morrisey announced an executive order directing state health officials to establish a process for objections on “religious or conscientious grounds� to vaccines required by state law to immunize schoolchildren against the most serious childhood diseases for admission.

The move’s critics have called it an unconstitutional power grab that jeopardizes public health in West Virginia.

It wasn’t Morrisey’s first time taking a stance in state office that threatened public health protections. As West Virginia’s attorney general, Morrisey was a prominent opponent of federal efforts to regulate harmful power plant and vehicle tailpipe emissions.

Morrisey opposed five major rules proposed or finalized by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency since 2022 the agency projected would avoid up to at least 10,000 premature deaths and 360,000 lost workdays while yielding roughly $600 billion in net benefits through 2055, according to a Gazette-Mail review of EPA rulemaking last year.

Morrisey often sued to block or undermine protections for transgender people, defending the state’s choice not to cover gender-affirming surgeries through the state’s Medicaid health insurance program and contending federal law doesn’t protect LGBTQ workers from discrimination based on gender identity.

Studies show transgender people have brain patterns and hormonal profiles different from people whose gender identity matches the sex they were assigned at birth, refuting Morrisey’s claim that “men are men� and “women are women.� Transgender persons have been documented in cultures and societies throughout the world since antiquity.

But none of Morrisey’s executive orders targeted water or air quality, health insurance burdens for a Mountain State facing steep climbs out of disproportionately high numbers of public water system violations, toxic air quality threats near schools and other public areas, and prevalence of medical debt much higher than the national rate.

“This is the birthplace of rivers, and there are folks in West Virginia that have never enjoyed a clean glass of water from the tap,� American Civil Liberties Union of West Virginia advocacy director Rusty Williams said in a phone interview. “It’s just insane when you look at the things that we’re facing here in West Virginia, and then you have Governor Morrisey prioritizing things like ending the woke mind virus — or whatever that means ... I just think that it’s a misguided set of priorities.�

But Morrisey has been governing in line with the conservative platform he ran on during his gubernatorial candidacy — one heavily supported by West Virginia’s health care industry.

WVU Medicine, Vandalia Health chiefs backed him

Morrisey’s gubernatorial campaign committee drew over $114,000 in support from health industry executives and political action committees, according to a Gazette-Mail review of campaign finance reports.

That included backing of executives throughout West Virginia University Medicine and the Vandalia Health system, which was created through the 2022 combination of the ÂÒÂ×ÄÚÉä Area Medical Center and Mon Health systems.

Morrisey campaign contributors included:

• $3,790: David Goldberg, Mon Health CEO
• $2,800: Albert Wright, Jr., WVU Medicine CEO
• $1,000: David Ramsey, Vandalia Health president
• $1,000: Jeffrey Sandene, Vandalia Health chief financial officer
• $1,000: George Farris, CAMC associate administrator
• $1,000: Jeffrey Goode, CAMC vice president of ambulatory services
• $521: Nicholas Barcellona, WVU Medicine chief financial officer
• $521: Gregory Rosencrance, Thomas Health president and CEO
• $500: John Frankovitch, Weirton Medical Center CEO
• $500: Daniel Stross, CAMC chief information officer
• $500: Anthony Condia, WVU Health System chief marketing officer

Vandalia Health spokesperson Dale Witte noted those were individual rather than company contributions and that CAMC, Vandalia Health and Mon Health don’t support candidates for public office. A WVU Medicine spokesperson said the health provider “honor(s) and respect(s)� employees’ rights to support candidates financially, calling them “personal and private decisions.�

But these executives’ support for Morrisey’s campaign are at odds with their health systems’ support for vaccines.

A WVU Medicine spokesperson said the health system, the state’s largest and consisting of 25 hospitals, supports the current requirements in West Virginia for childhood immunizations. The spokesperson called them “important for the well-being of children� with “a critical role in protecting their health and the health of their classmates.�

“Our caregivers, especially those at WVU Medicine Children’s Hospital, see the benefits of immunizations daily and believe they are important in protecting children,� the spokesperson said in an email.

Witte called vaccines “the major reason mortality has improved over the past several years.�

“Vaccines help create a healthier community and prevent the ravages of many diseases,� Witte said in an email. “Vaccines help protect our most precious resource which is our children.�

Global immunization efforts have saved at least 154 million lives over the past 50 years, a World Health Organization-led study published by The Lancet, a peer-reviewed journal, found last year.

West Virginia is one of only five states with no non-medical exemption from school immunization requirements, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

West Virginia had the highest school immunization rates for two-dose measles, mumps and rubella vaccine, five-dose diphtheria, tetanus, and acellular pertussis vaccine, four-dose polio and two-dose varicella vaccine in the 2023-24 school year, according to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data.

Neither the Mon Health System nor Morrisey’s office responded to requests for comment.

Advocates defend Medicaid amid GOP tax cut plans

At a news conference Tuesday, Morrisey stood before a whiteboard on which he wrote “$153 MEDICAID.�

Morrisey asserted $153 million of a $400 million-plus state budget deficit projected for fiscal year 2026 was a shortfall for the state’s share of Medicaid funding the state has been covering using “one-time money.�

“[I]f you keep just paying the bills from one-shot money, what happens? You run out of one-shot money, and you’re left with a big deficit,� Morrisey said.

Health advocates are concerned Medicaid spending could be slashed in West Virginia in line with Morrisey’s emphasis on addressing the budget shortfall while still intending to cut taxes — and amid Republican-controlled Congress’ consideration of rolling back Medicaid expansion to pay to extend tax cuts implemented under President Donald Trump’s first term in office.

Proposals being considered in a Republican-controlled Congress to convert federal Medicaid funding to block grants and impose per capita caps would leave tens of thousands of people uninsured and mean fewer resources for low-income families who rely on Medicaid for health coverage, West Virginians for Affordable Health Care executive director Ellen Allen predicted in a virtual health care discussion last week.

“Gutting Medicaid will take health care away from hard working families across West Virginia instead of helping them,� Allen said during the discussion hosted by Protect Our Care West Virginia, a health care advocacy group. “They deserve better. We deserve better.�

Witte, the CAMC spokesperson, noted Medicaid is a “significant payer for hospitals in West Virginia.�

“Medicaid coverage helps provide access to West Virginians who would otherwise be unable to pay for health care,� Witte said. “West Virginia is a rural state and access to care would be challenged if there were significant changes to Medicaid or Medicare.�

Medicaid is a means-tested entitlement program that finances medical services and one of the U.S. health care system’s biggest payers. Medicaid represented 17% of national health care spending in 2021, according to the Congressional Research Service.

The federal government and the states jointly finance Medicaid, with the former reimbursing the latter for a share of each state’s Medicaid program costs.

Medicaid spending in West Virginia totaled $5.5 billion in fiscal year 2022. The federal government paid 81.8% of those Medicaid costs, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, a health policy research nonprofit.

Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., said during a virtual news conference Thursday she believed lawmakers should consider adding a “work component� to Medicaid.

“We’re disincentivizing work here,� said Capito, new chairman of the Senate Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies Appropriations Subcommittee, which oversees funding across programs within the Departments of Labor, Education, Health and Human Services, and other independent agencies.

´¡Ìý2022 analysis by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated 2.2 million adults would lose Medicaid coverage if states were required to impose work requirements on Medicaid recipients.

The CBO estimated only a very small portion of adults subject to the new requirements would work more hours to avoid losing insurance through Medicaid. Employment would not increase much because many Medicaid recipients have limited access to work supports and don’t receive intensive case-management services, the CBO predicted.

“Medicaid’s primary purpose is to provide health coverage to low-income people,� Protect Our Care West Virginia director Lynette Maselli said during her group’s health care discussion last week. “It’s not a work program. It’s not a get-back-to-work program.�

Morrisey diagnoses ‘the woke virus’ again

Williams said it’s disappointing to see health executives supporting leaders like Morrisey who have ascended in a political climate in which West Virginians’ health has been under environmental and financial threat.

“We are forced to navigate the landscape as it is the best way we can,� Williams said. “And as an advocate, I just try to inspire folks to, especially when it comes to issues of pertaining to health care and things, you’ve got to be your own advocate.�

Morrisey on Friday applauded the Trump administration for revoking a Biden administration rule that included gender identity and sexual orientation in the definition of sex discrimination under Title IX, which was enacted in 1972 to stop sex-based discrimination and sexual harassment in federally funded educational programs and activities.

Morrisey said in a news release “the woke virus� had “infected� the Biden administration’s Department of Education.

Hours earlier, Williams had recalled state legislators admitting they didn’t heed the testimony of medical professionals who opposed their moves to ban gender-affirming care for minors. In 2023, the Republican-supermajority Legislature passed House Bill 2007 barring physicians from providing medical procedures to help a minor “with a gender transition� despite support from major medical organizations for gender-affirming care for youths.

“You have folks making decisions you know about life-altering health care decisions for their constituents, when, again, they’re not doctors,� Williams said. “I feel like as a citizen and as a patient, I should be able to sue the Legislature for practicing medicine without a license every time they do something like that.�