Protecting Pre-Existing Conditions & Making Health Care More Affordable Act of 2019
Position for the bill and testimony
The act Protecting Pre-Existing Conditions and Making Health Care More Affordable of 2019 should be voted for, approved, and made to be a law in the United States. According to Garrett & Gangopadhyaya (2016), people aged 18-65 years in the United States’ population that have pre-existing medical conditions are approximately 19-50 percent. In 2010, President Barack Obama passed the Affordable Care Act to be a law, and in 2014, the law was fully enacted. The laws required that people with pre-existing medical conditions were protected and ensured that insurance firms did not deny individuals with pre-existing conditions an insurance cover or charge more insurance costs for women.
However, with President Donald Trump’s administration, there have been trials to repeal the law and guts its safeguard for individuals with pre-existing conditions. Trump’s administration has promoted short-term plans, which generally favor the healthy population and discriminates against those with pre-existing conditions (Wallace, 2017). When insurance companies put into consideration an individual’s past medical history or family history of diseases, including cancer, diabetes mellitus, and hypertension, they deny this critical population the chance of acquiring affordable healthcare. Therefore, individuals with pre-existing medical conditions are forced to pay substantially more for health insurance or go without health insurance (Wallace, 2017). Health care is a right. It is not like any other commodity that, when not purchased by an individual, will not have a substantial effect on their livelihoods. When someone gets sick, and they are unable to afford care, it is wrong to deny them treatment for that fact. Don't use plagiarised sources.Get your custom essay just from $11/page
According to Bliemel et al. (2017), up to 61% of American’s could be having pre-existing medical conditions that can have a significant effect on the cost of health insurance or their eligibility to acquiring health coverage at all. If the Affordable Care Act will be repealed and its protections for coverage for individuals with pre-existing conditions removed, a large portion of America’s population would find it challenging to afford or obtain healthcare access. Under the coverage of ACA, there have been significant gains in access to care, as seen by the decline in cost-related health problems receiving care and by the increase in the number of people who report having a usual basis of care. Besides, the needs of people with pre-existing medical conditions change over time, depending on the health and social changes. For instance, people experience fluctuations in income, and their appropriateness for Medicaid based on their age, lose or gain employment, and other life changes (Buchmueller et al., 2016). Therefore, a bill protecting individuals with pre-existing medical conditions should be laid down to ensure no disparities in healthcare.
How to address the opponents in my position
When we have opponents of our opinions, we should not try to defeat them. Instead, we should find the truth. For instance, for my opponents in the position of the bill, describing the importance of protecting the rights of those people with pre-existing medical conditions and the importance of universal health coverage would be my argument. For example, I would point out the significance of protecting the welfare of people with pre-existing conditions due to their significant proportion. Also, research has shown the importance of the Affordable Care Act by substantially increasing the percentage of access to care (Buchmueller et al., 2016 ).
Amendments to the bill
In the case that an essential drug cannot be made available to an enrollee, such medication should be provided to the individual through the exceptions process made by the plan.
Rehabilitative services, together with habilitative services, should be covered by the plan.
References
Bliemel, C., Buecking, B., Oberkircher, L., Knobe, M., Ruchholtz, S., & Eschbach, D. (2017). The impact of pre-existing conditions on functional outcome and mortality in geriatric hip fracture patients. International orthopedics, 41(10), 1995-2000.
Buchmueller, T. C., Levinson, Z. M., Levy, H. G., & Wolfe, B. L. (2016). Effect of the Affordable Care Act on racial and ethnic disparities in health insurance coverage. American journal of public health, 106(8), 1416-1421.
Garrett, A. B., & Gangopadhyaya, A. (2016). Who gained health insurance coverage under the ACA, and where do they live?. Urban Institute, ACA Implementation—Monitoring and Tracking.
Wallace, E. V. (2017). Passing the Healthcare Bill from Obama to Trump: More Confusion, More Health Disparities. The Journal of Race & Policy, 13(1), 61-65.