A coalition of advocates for health care reform traveled from Scranton to Wilkes-Barre to Hazleton on Thursday in a Care-A-Van with a message to major insurance corporations calling for a healthcare cost freeze. The group was led by an ice cream truck and featured heart-shaped popsicles and ice sculptures with the message to executives: “Warm your hearts, freeze our costs.” Patients, community members, health advocates and caregivers spoke about their struggles with unaffordable healthcare, along with the spiraling cost of groceries, gas, housing and utilities. They delivered a petition to each of the insurance corporations with over 650 signers calling for a cost freeze. The contingent first stopped at the State Office Building on Lackawanna Avenue in Scranton, then moved to Highmark Health on North Main Street in Wilkes-Barre, then to Lehigh Valley Hospital-Jefferson Health on East Broad Street in Hazleton. The group then traveled to Geisinger Corporate Headquarters in Danville.
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Nursing home activities assistant Lori Obaroski, of Taylor, speaks to supporters, coalition leaders and health care union members at the Health-Care-A-Van rally on Lackawanna Avenue in Scranton Thursday, August 27, 2026. (SEAN MCKEAG / STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)
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Nursing home activities assistant Lori Obaroski, of Taylor, speaks to supporters, coalition leaders and health care union members at the Health-Care-A-Van rally on Lackawanna Avenue in Scranton Thursday, August 27, 2026. (SEAN MCKEAG / STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)
