The Affordable Care Act Of The United States

The Affordable Care Act was passed by Congress and then signed into law by President Obama on March 23, 2010. The law was enacted in two parts: The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act was signed into law on March 23, 2010 and was amended by the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act on March 30, 2010. The name “Affordable Care Act” is used to refer to the final, amended version of the law. The Act provided Americans with better health security by expanding coverage, held insurance companies accountable, lowered health care costs, guaranteed more choices and enhanced the care for all Americans (Medicaid.gov). Health insurance market places allowed shoppers to compare health plan that counted as minimum essential coverage.

For this reaction paper, I have chosen the topic of whether or not I believe that the Affordable Care Act (Obama Care) should be repealed, replaced with something else, or stay in its current form. I believe that Obama Care should be fully repealed. However, I don’t believe that just repealing this legislation is enough. I believe that there should be a series of reforms ready for implementation that follow free market principles and that will restore economic freedom.

Universal Healthcare in the United States has been a long time journey that dates back decades and we, as a country, are far behind other developed countries who have had universal healthcare for a long time. Today, Healthcare is obtained through employers or by people paying for it by themselves, which is incredibly expensive due to high premiums. Five years have passed since the controversial Obama care, or Affordable Care Act, was signed into law on March 23, 2010. The Affordable Care Act aimed at fixing the many problems that the United States has with healthcare by making it available to everyone, but also more efficient and this required drastic changes that made some people happy while others unhappy since some are benefiting while others are not. These people include politicians, but foremost presidential candidates. Candidate’s stance on the issue of healthcare is truly important due to the fact that if they’re the next president of the United States, it could hurt or improve the health care reform. Noteworthy candidates are: Jeb Bush, Hillary Clinton, Marco Rubio, and Bernie Sanders. Republicans and Democrats have long debated whether or not the Affordable Care Act should be repealed or replaced. Republicans believe that it is a problem while Democrats support it. The Affordable Care Act should not be replaced but instead improved because it provides quality and affordable health care to Americans. Everyone gets sick and people shouldn’t be afraid of receiving help

Except for crisis medicinal consideration, undocumented outsiders are not qualified for governmentally financed general medical coverage programs, including Medicare, Medicaid and the Child Health Insurance Program (CHIP). There is no sorted out, national system to give human services to undocumented youngsters. U.S.- conceived kids in blended status families might be qualified for Medicaid or CHIP on the off chance that they qualify on the premise of wage and age. Albeit elected assets may not be utilized to give non-crisis medicinal services to undocumented foreigners, a few states and nearby governments utilize their own

Undocumented immigrants in the United States are denied and limited to health care access due to their legal status. However, recent arrived immigrants are healthier than the general U.S. population. According to the National Longitudinal Mortality Study (1979-1989), “Singh and Siahpush (2001) found that all-cause mortality was significantly lower among immigrants than among the U.S. born (18% lower for men and 13% lower for women), after adjusting for age, race/ethnicity, marital status, urban/rural residence, education, occupation, and family income (Acevedo-Garcia & Bates, 2008). While policy and Health Care Acts are denying and limiting health insurance to undocumented immigrants and wanting them out of the country, that may not be an appropriate strategy to promote health insurance in Latino communities since recent arriving immigrants are healthier than the general U.S. population. Some studies suggest that, “Latino and immigrants have more positive health behaviors, particularly related to substance abuse, than their non-Latino and U.S. born counterparts. For example, compared to non-Latino whites, Latinos are less likely to consume cigarettes or alcohol, independent of SES (Abraido-Lanza, Chao, & Florez, 2005)(Acevedo-Garcia & Bates, 2008). However, after several years of acculturating into the majority culture, Latinos/as are becoming accustomed to unhealthy habits that American citizens are familiar with. Researchers have taken in consideration the Latino Health

As the implementation of The Affordable Care Act (ACA) nears, news media is featuring a large number of individuals whose health insurance coverage is being cancelled. The current administration claims that their objective is for everyone to have health insurance, but there is a gap between their new legislation and the results. American consumers are falling in the gap between private insurance plans that are too expensive, and the poorly developed government system. Despite claims from the Obama administration, the Affordable Care Act limits the American public’s choice of private health insurance plans.

Though the United States is known for having the highest quality health care in the

Insurers cover patients at no cost: Under the ACA, nearly all insurers most provide specific preventative care to patients, at no cost. (HHS.gov, 2016)

Research has proven that medicinal expenses of United States born individuals are far greater than of immigrants without insurance, who are liable for only 1% of total disbursements (Cevallos, 2014). In fact, the Medicare Trust Fund contributions by United States born individuals consumed more than they funded, which resulted in negative - $28.1 billion, while immigrants offered $115.2 billion (Cevallos, 2014). Individuals who are undocumented or born to immigrant parents are less likely to seek medical care throughout the year for acute or chronic circumstances, as well as having an increased risk of being uninsured and a decreased availability to preventative care (Cevallos, 2014). Lastly, instead of viewing Hispanic immigrants as a burden to the healthcare economy capitalizing in community programs that aid Hispanic immigrants could in turn provide a form of welfare for all (Cevallos, 2014).

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) legislated in 2010, has changed the United States health care industry. In addition to universal healthcare, one of the principles of the ACA is the ideal of accountable care. Specifically, adopting an Accountable Care organization (ACO) for Medicare beneficiaries under the fee for service program. An ACO seeks to hold providers and health organizations accountable for not only the quality of health care they provide to a population, but also keeping the cost of care down (1). This is accomplished by offering financial incentives to the healthcare providers that cooperate in, circumventing avoidable tests and procedures. The ACO model, seeks to remove present obstacles to refining the value of care, including a payment system that rewards the volume and intensity of provided services instead of quality and cost performance and commonly held assumptions that more medical care is equivalent to higher quality care (2) .A successful ACO model, will have developed quality clinical work and continual improvement while effectively managing costs, however this is contingent upon its ability to encourage hospitals, physicians, post-acute care facilities, and other providers involved to form connections that aid in coordination of care delivery throughout different settings and groups, and evaluate data on costs and outcomes(3). This establishes the ACO will need to have organizational aptitude to institute an administrative body to manage patient care,

Over the past fifty years, the method in which healthcare services are funded has gone through significant changes. The country has seen the expansion of insurance from paying medical bills for hospital stays, to the creation of managed care, and the passing of the Affordable Care Act (ACA). While the process has not been without challenges, healthcare administrators must continue to analyze past funding systems to understand the oversights and misinterpretations to prevent complications in the future. This paper will investigate fee-for-service practices and how these practices have progressed to uncontrolled utilization.

The Affordable Care Act completely changed the patient landscape of health care safety nets with its implementation in 2010. In particular, its expansion of Medicaid significantly shifted uninsured patient healthcare provider utilization, from emergency departments and free clinics, towards community health centers and federally qualified health centers. Yet major gaps in healthcare coverage persist due to states choosing not to expand Medicaid, exclusion of undocumented immigrants, and misunderstandings of the ACA. Health care safety net providers must understand their changing demographics and the needs of vulnerable uninsured patient populations. In doing so, healthcare safety net providers will be better informed in regards to necessary changes needed to thrive in the post-ACA era.

It is no surprise that the Affordable Care Act is a huge controversy in the U.S. presently, when it was first introduced there was a huge reaction on how this would never work. But what makes the Affordable Care Act work and not work when the people haven’t even given it a chance? Evidently the real problem is when people use and hear the term “social medicine.” This simple term shakes the nation and the minds of others go straight to a communism approach. In order to shed light and make the doubters aware that the ACA could work, we must look to other nations and examine their Health Care system and how it either benefits their country or not.

Affordable health care for everyone, sounds great for the citizens that have been affected or know someone that has been affected by bills that are left behind after treatment. However, there is a great deal of flaws with this. “As of 2014 all citizens of the U.S. were expected to be insured with minimal health care or face fines during the tax season of 2015, with the exception that they meet certain requirements” (Lawson 117). The PPACAs intention is to reduce the cost of health care insurance making it accessible for the American public, to decrease the national deficit, and to promote a healthier America. Little does the government know is that what will come out of this act is going to be worse. Is the Affordable Care Act going to

The socioeconomic spectrum is a crucial point to understanding social factors that can determine health (Marmot & Wilkinson, 2006). Although it’s not merely one particular class who is predisposed to diseases over another as Marmot and Wilkinson (2006) discuss, rather it is a lack of resources throughout a particular population. As stated by the World Health Organization (2016), there have been social policies put into place to assist with social determinants; policies such as unemployment, welfare, and social security disability, etc. However, the complexity arises with treating patients under social policies who may be undocumented citizens where poverty is prevalent and resources remain few, thus becoming a topic of health inequity (World Health Organization, 2016).