The initial and temporary difficulty millions of Americans
suffered when they first tried to sign up doesn't matter.
So the
Affordable Care Act didn’t exactly deliver the greatest website. What did we
get after all those years of haggling?
Only health
insurance for 9 million people (and
counting) who didn’t have it before. Only an end to pre-existing medical
conditions keeping you from getting health coverage. Only insurance for young adults
under their parents’ policies, a requirement that your health policy
cover preventive care, and health insurance plans that don’t cost any more for
the vast majority of Americans — and are somewhat more expensive for a tiny minoritywho are, in exchange, getting
better health coverage.
Just terrible.
I’m kidding.
The way some politicians and pundits have become obsessed with the problems of
the rollout of President Barack Obama’s signature achievement, you would think
he’d set up a social networking website for speed dating. But the Affordable
Care Act isn’t some kind of software. It’s health care.
What matters is
that it’s harder for your health insurance company to keep you from getting
coverage — or from dropping you when you’re ill. What matters is that you and
your children are more likely to get treated for medical problems under the
better health insurance policies that the government now requires. What matters
is that you will no longer face a
lifetime limit on payment for essential health benefits.
Keep in mind
that for years conservatives
denounced Social Security and Medicare as socialism. Now
they’re attacking the Affordable Care Act as “socialism” too.
What in
particular about this particular program is “socialistic”? Apparently that
everyone must have health insurance either from a private or government
insurer. Now we’re all slaves because we have to have health insurance.
Rubbish. We’re
all required to do many things some people wish they didn’t have to do.
We have to have
car insurance when we drive, so we can afford to pay for the damage we may
cause if we’re at fault in an accident. We must vaccinate our children before
they go to school so we don’t go back to having mumps or measles or polio
epidemics sweep through our elementary schools. We have to pay taxes so we can
have teachers in our schools, police and fire protection, inspectors to ensure
safe working conditions, clean food and air, and effective prescription drugs.
When people
without health insurance rely on an emergency room to give them care they can’t
afford, the hospital winds up paying for their care, or the rest of us pay for
it when the hospital raises its rates to offset the unpaid bills of the
uninsured. We all have to have health insurance so that someone else isn’t
forced to pick up the tab when we have a medical catastrophe.
It’s not
tyranny. It’s simply responsibility.
Mitchell
Zimmerman is an attorney who lives in Northern California. He supplements his
work as a Silicon Valley intellectual property lawyer with pro bono work on
behalf of the underrepresented. Distributed via OtherWords (OtherWords.org)