Obama Care Wins!

Thank you Chief Justice Roberts, for acting like a Supreme Court Judge is supposed to, voting on the legality of a program, not the politics of it.

Obama Care is pretty much based on Romney Care - enacted in Massachusetts while Mitt Romney was governor. Ironic, isn't it.

Here's what  Obama Care - the Patient Protection and Affordable Health Care Act -  will do for you (some of these roll out gradually by 2014).

If you are over 65 you are already receiving more preventive care for free, including free annual physicals.  Any screening recommended by the US Preventive Medicine Task force, is now free. Your prescription costs have gone down, there is much better drug coverage.

If you have uninsured children under 26, you can now include them in your family health insurance. The day the act was signed into law 3.5 million uninsured young people became insured.

No one can be turned down for insurance because of pre-existing conditions, including pregnancy.   The law also prevents insurance companies from dropping you from your existing insurance because you become ill. This covers babies and children immediately.  For adults, there is now a 6 month waiting period, but that goes away by 2014. 

Insurers cannot place dollar limits on the amount of coverage you receive during your lifetime.

The law also requires that insurers cover out of pocket costs for many proven preventive screening tests, such as colonoscopies and mammograms, and vaccinations. Some of this rolls out gradually.

There's a big increase in the range of women's health care, including pre-natal and post-partum care, as well as access to contraception.

With State's approval, Medicaid will be expanded to include more Americans - as many as 16 million Americans who are currently uninsured will be insured.  (States who opt out - shame on you)


I am currently in the UK, where the NHS is having lots of problems.  These problems are completely the result of under-funding. According to the Guardian, in 2006 the UK spent 8.2% of the GNP on health care (while covering every single person in the country for everything - with no copays or other complications) while the US spent 15.8 % - nearly twice as much.  And what does that buy?


LIfe expectancy at birth in the UK is 80 years, in the US it's 78 years. The US ranks 30th in infant mortality - behind pretty much every other developed country. One in eight births in the US is preterm, compared with 1 in 18 in Ireland and Finland. 


I won't go on.  I really do not understand why anyone with any sense at all can be against universal health care.  


Oh - and the Death Panel idiocy?  The origin of that was a provision that physicians discuss end-of-life care with the elderly.  How can anyone, of any age, not want to discuss that?  Who would not want to have the opportunity to have some say in these decisions - instead of leaving it to health care providers who don't know you or your loved ones at a vulnerable time.  


Sigh. 


Off to hike around Devil's Dyke.  (literally - not metaphorically)