Where U.S. Athletes Always Lose: Healthcare
When the Winter Games ended, so did Americans’ access to a standard of care on par with other democracies.
By Megan Armstrong
Recently, U.S. Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R-IA) twisted herself in a pretzel trying to rationalize the soaring cost of healthcare in the United States.
“You need to have a system that does both: Takes care of you when you’re ill and you’re sick, but also incentivizes to adopt healthy behaviors that keep you healthier and out of the hospital,” Meeks told Adam Goodman. “When there’s a co-pay and a deductible, there’s some skin in the game. Patients don’t over-utilize [doctors], and they’re more likely to adopt healthy behaviors, whether it’s decreasing smoking or more exercise.”
Who was more incentivized than Lindsey Vonn?
The U.S. ski legend ended her five-year retirement in 2024 and did everything she could to prepare her body to recapture glory at the 2026 Milan Cortina Winter Olympics. But then, intention lost out to physics during the women’s downhill. Vonn clipped the fourth gate, crashed violently into the snow, and had to be airlifted off the mountain. Vonn underwent several major surgeries to save her left leg from amputation.
In the United States, it is the norm to glorify athletes who push through pain, but then turn around and shun athletes — or anyone — once their body fails them through no fault of their own.
If Vonn’s crash had happened at home, her unavoidable treatment could have cost her hundreds of thousands of dollars.
But she crashed at the Olympics.
At every Olympics since 1932 — 1932! — every Olympian in the Olympic Village has received free healthcare during the Games. According to Sportico, medical services are covered by the local organizing committee and, in the case of the 2026 Milan Cortina Winter Games, were part of a $2 billion budget. Six “polyclinics” offered free access to “everything from eye checks to dentistry to OB-GYN services.” Free healthcare access also includes “several primary and secondary hospitals, should an athlete need to visit a trauma center for critical injuries,” like Vonn.
“What we’re really trying to do is not only provide ongoing and long-term care for our athletes so that they have the optimal recovery, [but] we’re also trying to eliminate any type of financial barrier to seeking that type of care,” Team USA chief medical officer Jonathan Finnoff told Sportico.
Somehow, Finnoff’s sentiment remains a novel concept in the U.S. — the only developed, high-income nation on Earth without universal healthcare. The only nation where Team USA rugby player Ariana Ramsey could go viral for staying an extra week after winning the bronze medal to cram in a year’s worth of medical appointments for free at the 2024 Paris Olympics.
In the U.S., even legendary, wealthy athletes have to sacrifice for health insurance. Venus Williams, 45, half-joked that she’s still playing tennis “for the insurance.” She added, “You guys know what it’s like. Let me tell you: I’m always at the doctor’s, so I need this insurance.” (Williams has Sjögren’s and underwent surgery to remove fibroids in 2024.) Forty-four-year-old Philip Rivers, a 2026 Pro Football Hall of Fame semifinalist, ended his retirement and played for the Indianapolis Colts last season -- delaying his Hall of Fame eligibility by five years and restarting the five-year clock on his NFL-provided health insurance.
Back at Milan Cortina, Team USA men’s hockey hero Jack Hughes was lucky that he’s also a star for the NHL’s New Jersey Devils, which will cover the extensive dental work required to fix his injuries suffered in the team’s victorious gold medal game against Canada.
Hughes signed an eight-year, $64 million contract with the Devils in 2021, and Vonn reportedly earns $8 million annually, so they likely have top-shelf health insurance. Athletic and financial stature don’t disqualify anyone from the right to free healthcare, but most Olympians lack any safety net. As revealed by the Commission on the State of U.S. Olympics & Paralympics’ 277-page report from March 2024, most Olympians, like at least 56% of Americans, can’t afford healthcare at all. The report, in small part, revealed that 26.5% of current athletes earned less than $15,000 per year. “Some of the most talented competitors under our flag go to sleep at night under the roof of a car or without sufficient food or adequate health insurance,” the report said.
Under the Trump administration’s “Make America Healthy Again” agenda, it’s only getting more inhumane. They have gutted the CDC and HHS and withdrawn from the WHO, among many ineffably evil assaults on human life. The Trump admin’s proposed replacement for the Affordable Care Act reportedly includes a plan with a $15,000 annual individual deductible and $31,000 annual family deductible.
Elsewhere , Dr. Mehmet Oz, Administrator of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, and Vice President JD Vance announced that $259 million in Medicaid funding would be withheld in Minnesota. While Dr. Oz and Vance enforced a nationwide moratorium on Medicare enrollment for Durable Medical Equipment, such as prosthetics and orthotics, the chronically shirtless HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. promoted a MAHA-coded action figure.
MAHA and MAGA are working overtime to make people sicker and, in turn, their billionaire friends richer. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) head Todd Lyons literally wants to turn human bodies for profit, reportedly saying he wants ICE to operate “like [Amazon] Prime, but with human beings.”
The stakes have never been higher in the U.S. to treat one’s health with vigilance. But placing the burden squarely on the patient — framing illness as a moral failure — is the con of MAHA. The most hyper-vigilant people can’t avoid genetic diseases, evasive pathogens, or freak injuries. The best self-care will never replace systemic care, despite what Casey Means, Trump’s surgeon general nominee, blathered on about during her Senate hearing last week.
Health care should be approached like the basic human right it is — like it is at the Olympics. Several states have gotten close. It took New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani fewer than 10 days in office to partner with New York Governor Kathy Hochul on universal child care. Mamdani shines an uncomfortable light on what can be achieved relatively easily when politicians actually care.
At the 2026 Milan Cortina Winter Olympics, Olympians shed light on the health dichotomy we all face. The human body can be miraculous, but it can also be unexpectedly cruel. The system shouldn’t be even crueler.
Megan Armstrong is a freelance journalist, podcast producer, and perpetual content consumer. Her work has appeared in Billboard, Boardroom, Esquire, GQ, GRAMMY.com, NYLON, Teen Vogue, The Kansas City Star, The Hollywood Reporter, UPROXX, and elsewhere.
Very enlightening. Olympians have healthcare similar to Congressfolk. How's that for a parallel?
I recall seeing a documentary about jockeys who literally live lives of pain and sacrifice, bingeing and purging to make weight and suffering great joint stress, in service to the rich people who own Thoroughbreds--just so they can race. I'm sure piloting a racehorse is like downhill skiing on pristine snow. There is nothing like it. Yet these jockeys largely had no paid healthcare and died in pain and obscurity, some after making their horses and trainers rich and famous. There's another parallel to whom and what we value in this country.
The old saying "where there's a will, there's a way" (Mamdani & Hochul) still holds, except the fascists in our government (president and congress) have never had the will to do what's right and the Democrats have never had the necessary votes. We have been, and are, a banana republic.