ObamaCare is a dubbed name for the Patient Protection and the Affordable Care Act, a bill signed into law to reform the health care industry by President Barack Obama on March 23, 2010.
Main Aims Of ObamaCare
ObamaCare’s main goal is to give more Americans access to affordable quality health insurance and to reduce healthcare spending in the US.
It will not replace private insurance companies since people can still continue to have health care coverage of their choice.
Strict regulations on for-profit health care industry.
New Benefits, Rights and Regulations:
New health insurance plans generously cover preventive services and provide essential benefits including yearly checkups, maternity care, mental health, mammograms and colonoscopies at a no out-of-pocket cost.
ObamaCare includes provisions that restrict insurance companies from dropping you when you are severely sick or made an honest mistake in your application form. It also disregards gender discrimination and unjustified rate hikes.
Obama Care Cost Assistance:
Advanced Premium Cost Credits
Cost Sharing Subsidies
Coinsurance and Deductibles
This plan is a real boon to the 15 million Americans who are not insured. The rest must obtain health coverage by 2014, get an exemption, or pay a fee.
Looking at the big plan, with all its conditions, I feel this is Obama’s sincere effort to help reduce health care costs in the USA. There are still millions who live in the state who are not insured at all, and thousands who fear going broke if they have to spend on medical services. This plan will stand by these people in times of financial crisis due to medical reasons. At the same time, many are concerned about long waiting periods and strife between government insurance and private insurance.
While Obama and his supporters in the Democratic Party portray the law as a historic effort to extend healthcare coverage to the millions of Americans who lack it, the law’s opponents say it amounts to an unprecedented intrusion into Americans’ private lives.
Tuesday being the first day of registration, online health insurance marketplaces struggled to keep up with the higher than expected demand. Users also encountered some bugs and crashes of the website. Obama acknowledged these issues.
“We found out that there have been times this morning where the site has been running more slowly than it normally will,” Mr Obama said.
“The reason is because more than one million people visited healthcare.gov before 7:00 in the morning.”
The Shutdown
Republicans across the country strive to undo this law, with the House of Representatives trying to repeal or cut down its funding.
On Tuesday, the US government shut down all the non-essential services, when the Democrats who control the Senate refused to agree to Republican demands to repeal the health law or delay the individual mandate.
Both Obama and congressional democrats have said they will not negotiate on Obamacare, with Obama on Monday evening accusing the Republicans of attempting to refight the last election.
In spite of all this political turmoil, Americans could still register for various insurance plans on Tuesday.
For further details, take a look at this website.
http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/medical_examiner/2013/09/obamacare_explained_questions_answered_about_how_and_why_to_sign_up_and.html
Information Sources: Obamacare Facts, BBC News
What are your thoughts on Obamacare? Are the regulations bad or good?