Despite its naysayers' non-stop tongue-clucking and finger-wagging, the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is proving to be more popular than even its most dedicated boosters expected. As of March 31st, the sign-up deadline, more than seven million have signed up, not including the state-operated exchanges, nor Medicaid beneficiaries (in the states that have allowed it). Others are still waiting in the wings; many had attempted to apply, but were unable to complete the process owing to system-overload-related crashes. (They're being granted deadline extensions).
Sure, the Affordable Care Act has its warts, but for millions of its beneficiaries, it's a vast improvement over the alternative --- which for many was no coverage at all. Senator Mitch McConnell still insists that the ACA is an impending catastrophe. This, despite the fact that in his native state, His Old Kentucky Home, the ranks of the uninsured have been cut by 40%.
I'd like to offer a couple of anecdotes from two splendid bloggers with The Daily Kos:
1) A gentleman who uses the handle "Old Redneck" had been volunteering at a local library in rural Virginia, assisting an ACA "regional navigator" signing uninsured people up for Obamacare. One of the clients they helped was a single mother of three whose husband had been killed in an industrial accident. She works two part-time jobs and, lacking insurance, couldn't remember when any of her family had last seen a doctor. The navigator found her a policy that pays 95% of her medical bills; her premium is $51 a month. In Old Redneck's words,
She didn't believe it when the navigator printed
her insurance card on the spot. When the fact
of what she had done finally sunk in, she
couldn't stop crying and hugging everyone
in sight. Neither could the rest of us.
2) A young blogger who calls himself "UntyingTheNot" also extolled the virtues of the ACA. UTN stated that his new policy has enabled him to see a doctor for the first time in five years. A fledgling business owner, he works a couple of part-time jobs that enable him to subsist, qualifying him for Medicaid.
Owing to the lengthy time lapse since his last medical exam, his doctor advised him to get a detailed lab work-up as well as vital medication for an ongoing health issue to which he hadn't been attending. His physician also cautioned him to "make 100% sure that your Medicaid is worked out before going for this. [Otherwise] It'd cost over $1000 out of pocket." (Also his prescription would run over $300 a month).
UTN then did the computations. For a wage-earner making $10 an hour, an office visit ($135) in addition to the $1000 lab work plus a year of essential medication ($3600), 473.5 hours --- 12 weeks of full-time work would be required. Of course this excludes all other expenses necessary for basic survival, such as --- uh --- food and shelter.
Absurd, right? Well, this well explains why, prior to the ACA, 47 million Americans had no health insurance!
These two fine bloggers have demonstrated the absolutely vital need for the ACA more effectively than I ever could. Thanks guys!
Oh, by the way Mr. McConnell, what did you mean by impending catastrophe? And Ms. Boonstra (see previous post), shouldn't you feel ashamed?
What about the 40-41 million who remain uninsured for various reasons/roadblocks? The six or seven million currently signed up are not a resounding affirmation nationally, numbers-wise, despite your positive comments here. The ACA is a too-complicated, (largely) too-expensive, overly ambitious project, as I've said from the start, despite the administration's attempted patches. Insurance companies don't give a damn about whether people live or die; Frontline's insurance industry whistle blowers exposed that more than once. Your human interest story here loses credibility due to the lack of specifics and actual names, except for the politicians'. I can't/don't respect anonymous comments or those signed with "handles", it's far too easy to fiddle with facts. The math here is absurd, I agree, but there are STILL many high, prohibitive insurance costs to would-be consumers of the marketplace. So, basically, the entire USA, with some positive exceptions, is STILL in the crapper, health-coverage wise. Being politically partisan is not going to profit our nation as a whole, I've come to realize for some time now,
ReplyDeleteNow it is personal, with me being dropped by Illinois Medicaid because of an error my
ReplyDeletelocal public aid office made back in December (I have the proof); now Social Security out of Kansas City (home of brilliant ideas like Creationism) has deducted $100 from my monthly check of $1,000 to pay for Medicaid Part B for me, without asking/notifying me first. I've seen sooo many left hand, right hand problems over the past year with this gigantic switch in insurance coverage gears...The Daily Kos, like many in the media, does make mistakes, as I just found in a few of their articles right now. There are Dinos, Rinos, and now a new term, "Pinos", Progress in name only. All three of these need to be looked at with great skepticism.
Dinos and Rinos I can live with easily...it's the "Pinos" that make me highly exercised. However, with any humans, extra research is usually advisable....!
DeleteIt is Kansas City, Kansas, not Missouri, that wishes to muddy science with religion in the same science class...my error earlier. Can't namers of cities show a little more originality?
DeleteActually, the seven million figure applies only to those who have signed up on the website, healthcare.gov. Others who have registered with state exchanges, as well as Medicaid beneficiaries (who don't face a deadline) represent a significant number beyond the seven million. That stated, I agree that there are probably still a lot of folks left uninsured. Additionally, I agree that the ACA is expensive and cumbersome to administer, as I've stated in previous posts. I believe that Single Payer would be far cheaper and certainly more inclusive. However, considering the toxicity of our political environment, I think that it's no small miracle that any sort of healthcare legislation was passed. In regard to the bloggers whose posts I cited, I have no reason to doubt their veracity. While its true that some folks use handles as a shield in order to spew vitriol, there are far more bloggers with respectable intentions who simply prefer to use handles instead of their real names. I have no reason to believe that either "Old Redneck" or 'UntyingTheNot" would play loosey-goosey with the facts. I'm sure they could be verified. Yep, I further agree that the insurance providers are still making out like bandits. Their profits are ratcheted up with our tax dollars. But at least, families and individuals who were once unable to have access to any health care at all, now have it ---- even though much of it is subsidized, especially in the case of the beneficiaries of extended Medicaid. Many of the folks still out of the loop live in one of the 20+ states whose legislators have made the conscious decision to reject the ACA's Medicaid subsidies for ideological reasons.
DeleteAs meticulous as you are with documentation, here's hoping that the Illinois Medicaid glitch gets quickly resolved to your satisfaction.
DeleteThanks. You must comment on my recent posts to make an honest man of yourself....
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