Opposite directions?
©2012 Am Ang Zhang
Now that Obama is re-elected for his second term, Obamacare looks like having a good chance of moving health care in the US in quite the opposite direction to where our NHS is moving.
The following was published just before the election:
The Affordable Care Act's benefits are hidden beneath the alarmist rhetoric
Nov 5, 2012
Columnist Wendell Potter Robin Holland
Wouldn’t it be
great if our candidates had to take a dose of truth serum every morning before
hitting the campaign trail? If they did, those of us who will be voting
tomorrow wouldn’t be nearly as confused about what Obamacare is and what it
isn’t, what it will do and what it won’t.
Since there is
no such truth serum requirement, I believe that many of us will actually be
voting against our own best interests. Many Americans will vote for candidates
who have scared them into believing that Obamacare is a government takeover of
health care that it will bankrupt the country while slashing Medicare benefits.
In the event
that you or someone you know might benefit from some truth-telling, here, then,
are a few things you ought to know before pulling that lever tomorrow:
·
The Affordable Care Act is not a government takeover that has put us on a
slippery slope toward socialism, or even toward a single-payer system like the
one in the People’s Republic of Canada
·
The legislation is not going to add trillions to the deficit, even though it
will expand Medicaid and provide subsidies to low-income individuals and
families to buy private coverage.
·
The Affordable Care Act will not cut Medicare benefits.
One of the
reasons the hospital industry endorsed Obamacare is that by bringing more
people into coverage, hospitals will not
have to provide nearly as much uncompensated care, which hits their bottom
lines very hard. So hospitals were quite willing to go along with a reduction
in future payments from the government because they know they will more than
make up for it by having far fewer uninsured patients.
Here are some things the law will do:
·
It will prohibit insurance companies from refusing to sell coverage to people
simply because they have one or more pre-existing conditions.
·
It will also prohibit them from cancelling our coverage when we get sick just
to avoid paying for our care.
·
It will prohibit insurers from charging women more than men for comparable
coverage and will not allow them to charge older folks more than three times as
much as younger folks.
·
It will require them to spend at least 80 percent of what we pay in premiums
actually paying claims and improving care.
·
It will allow young adults—who comprise the largest segment of the uninsured—to
stay on their parents’ policies until age 26.
·
It will reduce the number of uninsured Americans by at least 30 million if all
the states agree to accept federal dollars to expand their Medicaid programs.
That said,
Obamacare is not a panacea for all that ails the U.S.
