Quality, affordable healthcare should never be considered a luxury item for working families or retirees. Unfortunately, rapidly rising costs coupled with politically driven, woke policies are effectively making basic healthcare less accessible (or outright unethical) for those who need it.

A recent PwC report warned that healthcare costs are expected to rise a whopping 7% in 2024 alone.  This is absolutely crushing for the millions of people in the United States who are already suffering under the current healthcare system, as rising prices  force them to delay or forgo care altogether. As rates continue to increase, patients can expect to pay even higher premiums or out-of-pocket expenses they can’t afford. Low-income residents will suffer from this shift the most.

It would be one thing if these expensive rates were for elective services. Yet hospitals and healthcare systems frequently overcharge for the most basic care while  hiding their pricing  information to avoid accountability. They’re good at getting away with it too. In the absence of any semblance of transparency or accountability, top hospitals charge an average of seven times the actual cost of care for their services.

These wildly out-of-control costs are in many ways endemic to the rotting industry itself — an industry that once championed life and the Hippocratic Oath to “do no harm.” Now that same industry engages in morally depraved procedures such as radical transgender interventions and abortions and actively discriminates against people of faith who disagree with them. And not only that, conscientious citizens are often forced to fund such objectionable procedures through their healthcare plans.

That’s one reason why healthcare sharing ministries are gaining prominence among those who are sick of paying crippling prices to an industry that overwhelmingly hates their values. They offer patients a viable alternative by respecting the values of members while fighting to keep healthcare costs as low as possible.

Unlike traditional insurers, healthcare sharing ministries are typically faith-based and are committed to protecting life from conception to natural death. At my own healthcare sharing ministry, Solidarity HealthShare, we are proudly exempt from federal requirements that compel funding for immoral procedures, drugs, and devices via the Affordable Care Act. We are committed to protecting the conscience rights of our members who refuse to be a part of woke politicians’ shameless attempts to take over healthcare.

Healthcare sharing ministries are also an increasingly tempting option because they advocate on behalf of members for the highest-quality option at the lowest possible cost. For example, through our model of repricing, Solidarity uses the Medicare Allowable Amount as the baseline for what a given procedure should cost. We then set a fair and just price and negotiate with providers directly to achieve the greatest possible medical savings for our community. This pricing model has consistently saved Solidarity Members 60-70% on billed charges. So while the healthcare industry hides pricing breakdowns from patients and drastically overcharges for simple services, healthcare sharing ministries work to see that patients and families in their care can access basic healthcare without breaking the bank.

Thankfully, many people are waking up to the reality that our healthcare industry is broken and routinely takes advantage of them at a time when skyrocketing prices already make basic necessities unaffordable. People of faith and low-income residents especially are feeling trapped in a system that they can’t financially or morally afford.

I hope and pray everyone will that eventually wake up to this reality and say no to a system that is bankrupting them and spurning their most cherished values. Through higher quality, ethical care, our nation will be full of the happier, healthier individuals and families upon which our nation's future depends.

Chris Faddis is the president of  Solidarity HealthShare , a healthcare sharing ministry guided by the moral teachings of the Catholic Church that negotiates directly with providers to ensure the delivery of high-quality and affordable, life-affirming healthcare for the more than 40,000 members it has served since 2016.