“Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness” are the inalienable rights which our government was created to secure. Thomas Jefferson famously penned these words when authoring the Declaration of Independence, but nearly 250 years later, those rights are at risk for dialysis patients thanks to a recent Supreme Court ruling. This June, in Marietta Memorial Hospital Employee Health Benefit Plan v. DaVita Inc., the high court sided with a private insurer that was being sued for limiting its coverage of dialysis to 30 treatments. The court ruled the plan wasn’t discriminating against kidney disease patients, as the 30 treatment threshold applied to [...]

Four simple words sit above the entrance to the Supreme Court: “Equal Justice Under Law.” That short phrase, though, carries immense weight. It is a promise to the American people that we will receive fair treatment in our justice system, and serves as a principle to guide people in power. For dialysis patients – who already face massive health disparities – it’s a promise that might go unfulfilled following a Supreme Court decision earlier this year that could open the door for health insurance companies to discriminate against them. In Marietta Memorial Hospital Employee Health Benefit Plan v. DaVita Inc., the Court ruled [...]