Intoduction To The Affordable Care Act

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) is a healthcare reform that was signed into law by President Obama on March 23, 2010. It is formally known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and informally known as Obamacare. 

The Affordable care act put in measures to make sure that people were getting the care they need and deserve. The ACA made sure that Insurance companies could not discriminate against people with preexisting, meaning that they could no longer deny you coverage or charge you more for it. It made sure that essential health benefits were covered by insurance. Those essential health benefits include hospitalization, surgery, prescription medication, maternity coverage, preventative services, and more. The ACA provided subsidies so that people below a certain income level could pay for their insurance premiums. They implemented subsidies because the price of insurance went up due to the fact that insurance companies couldn't discriminate anymore, which is what kept the insurance costs so low in the first place. So the subsidies help to cut those costs for people who couldn't afford them. It also called for a nationwide Medicaid expansion. This made more people eligible to be covered by Medicaid. The Affordable Care Act has done more but there are just big things that it has done.  

The Affordable Care Act has had some major accomplishments since it's been put in place. Charles Gaba, who track Obamacare enrollments, stated in an interview, "Of those 50 million who were completely uninsured before the ACA, it cut that down by a good 40% and, 20 million people gained coverage, about two-thirds of those were through Medicaid expansion in most of the States." Gaba does say, however, that the ACA does need a lot of improvement. He states in the interview, "I think of it like a 1.0 version of software, you know, where it's a great concept. It has a lot of great features, but there are still some serious problems that should be, you know, that need to be fixed." So even though the ACA has done some major good it can be improved so that people in America are getting the best healthcare possible.