Thank God the Senate failed to pass the “skinny repeal” bill of the Affordable Care Act!
It still is difficult for me to fathom how so many of our leaders fail to comprehend how difficult it is to access healthcare for many Americans.
The Affordable Care Act (ACA) had greatly improved access back when it was passed in 2010.
Now, it isn’t perfect, by any means.
There 3 key aspects of healthcare that need to be addressed (at a high level!) and they are:
- Cost
- Quality
- Access
The ACA (aka ObamaCare since many in our country did not know they are one and the same) made significant strides on #3 but did not address #1 and #2.
So, if people are complaining that premiums and deductibles are still increasing, well, they were already doing so even before ACA and the ACA wasn’t designed to fix that. What it did was provide more than 22 million Americans access to care.
There are still many things to fix in our healthcare system. Many of you know that I have oft mentioned (face-to-face and not on the Internet) my desire for universal healthcare in some form for those of us in the USA. However, it’s a complex, thorny problem that is tied to our political system and the powerful lobbies of the pharma, insurance and medical device companies.
For today at least, let’s leave those concerns on the parking lot and celebrate that 3 Republican and 48 Democratic Senators voted against repealing the ACA, this continuing access to healthcare for millions of vulnerable people!