Issue Position: Affordable Care Act

Issue Position

From 1984 -- 1989 I had no health insurance. And because I didn't, neither did my family. No parent should have the anxiety of having a child with a fever that does not break in 24 -- 36 hours and, with no health insurance, knowing that their next option may be the emergency room…the most expensive healthcare in any county in America.

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) is the most comprehensive healthcare law passed since Medicare and Medicaid in the mid-1960s, and meets a variety of national healthcare needs.

It is a bold step in reducing the number of citizens with no healthcare insurance coverage. The recent creation of "urgent care clinics" points to the desire of everyone to offer non-emergency room care for minor needs. The ACA now allows over 8 million Americans to have a primary care -- family physician.

As the time to complete a college degree increases from the former four years to five, or more with specialized or additional education, the ACA create healthcare coverage opportunities for those citizens up to the age of twenty-six.

Citizens with "pre-existing conditions" that were formerly denied healthcare coverage can now obtain it. And even minor illnesses that formerly could drain the savings of a family, much less major ones that could bankrupt it, are more financially manageable under the ACA.

Insurance companies, sensitive to the increased economic strain passed on to procedures at hospitals for the insured, can now reduce some of that premium stress by having more citizens covered under the ACA.

Small employers that offer no healthcare coverage, and were simply a stepping stone for an employee until a position that offered health insurance became available, can now reduce their employee turnover.

The ACA is not perfect, but it requires a commitment to continue to work on it to make it better, rather than killing it completely. To do so now would throw 8 million of our fellow citizens back into the despair and fear of living without any healthcare insurance coverage.

The issue of having no healthcare insurance is not theoretical to me or my family. I will fight to preserve and improve the Affordable Care Act.

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