Obamacare Is Saving Lives. But Does Anyone Care?
Obamacare Is Saving Lives. But Does Anyone Care?
By Annie
Dean Angstadt, a 57-year-old, self-employed logger, said that the Affordable Care Act saved his life. He was unemployed when a faulty aortic valve necessitated heart surgery. His plan kicked in, and he had the surgery just days later.
Kathy Bentzoni, a 58-year-old Pennsylvanian, is also thankful for Obamacare. Just after she got coverage, doctors discovered that she had a rare blood disorder. Without the law, she said, she would be "probably dead."
Joshua Haymore, a 27-year-old Coloradan, could not get a specialist to see him for weeks last year while he was uninsured, and his ulcerative colitis worsened to the point that he nearly died, his mother told me. His family ended up paying up to $800 a month for drugs to keep the condition in check. Now that he has Medicaid, his prescriptions cost $3 and his health has improved significantly.
Those are just three of thousands of good-news stories coming from the insurance expansion in the Affordable Care Act. Across the country, the law is improving access to doctors, prompting low- and middle-income Americans to use more medical care, protecting families from financial distress, and ultimately saving lives — as many as 24,000 a year, back-of-the-envelope math suggests.
Those are exactly the sort of life-saving and life-changing outcomes that Democrats have eagerly awaited since the law was signed nearly five years ago, outcomes that might brighten the public’s perception of the Affordable Care Act after years of unremitting Republic attacks.
Finally, President Obama has gotten to describe the law in personal and moral terms, rather than as a dry, numbers-and-bullet-points policy. “Those who have based their entire political agenda on repealing it have to explain to the country why Jeanne should go back to being uninsured. They should explain why Sean and his family should go back to paying thousands and thousands of dollars more. They’ve got to explain why Marla doesn’t deserve to feel like she’s got value,” he thundered this spring.
But there is scant evidence that Americans have started to take notice, or care. More than half of the country has an unfavorable view of Obamacare, a proportion that has been rising of late. The Democrats who passed the law are generally avoiding discussing it this election cycle: “We're not running on or from the Affordable Care Act," House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi told the website Vox. Republicans, for their part, continue to howl for its repeal and focus on its downsides, including its trillion-dollar price tag.
more...
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2014/08/obamacare-is-saving-lives-but-does-anyone-care.html?utm_content=buffer1c058&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer
= new reply since forum marked as read
