PPACA Legislation

HCA625

PPACA Legislation

Introduction

This paper discusses the PPACA legislation that was passed by the house of the US and signed into law by the president, Barack Hussein Obama. We will take a critical and an analytical look at the legislation and derive a conclusion as to whether the legislation is an improvement to our health system or not. This essay covers an introduction, an analysis of the PPACA law and then we draw a conclusion to the effect of the advantages and the disadvantages of the legislation.

PPACA (Patient Protection and Affordable Care act)

This is federal statute which was signed to be law by the president of the United States of America Barack Obama. This was signed into law on March 23rd in the year 2010 (Barkin, 2011). It is also usually referred to Obama care or Affordable Care Act. This act brought about a major important overhaul in the US healthcare system. Viola (2013) notes that nothing of the sort had happened since the year 1965 where the act of Medicare and Medicaid was signed into law. In this act, hospitals and primary physicians will have to change their activities financially, their technology and also clinically in order to provide a better health systems (Viola, 2013).

PPACA was intended to improve the quality and make the health insurance affordable to every US citizen. It was also meant to bring down the uninsured rate through promoting public and private insurance coverage, to bring down the expense incurred during health care for the citizens and the government at large (Ed, 2010). The law necessitates all insurance companies to cover every applicants within the new least standards and offer the equal rate regardless of the already existing conditions or gender (Viola, 2013). The budget committee said they were intending to bring down both the future loss and the cost spent in the Medicare.

Pros

It will Increase coverage

About thirty-two million citizens of America that were not covered will have benefited by getting cover by the end of the year 2014 (Viola, 2013). This citizens would not have been covered if not for this act being signed into law.

It will reduce health care costs

The Congressional Budget Office projected that the cost of healthcare would reduce because the act will make sure nearly 95 percent of the citizens to have health insurance and ensuring that preventive measures is more available to all (Cara, 2012). All the newly insured will have the advantage of not waiting until their ailment to be extreme forcing them to use an emergency room that is usually more costly.

No denial by insurance companies to patients with pre-existing conditions

This acts protects citizens with pre-existing condition from being side-lined by the insurance company. All citizens will be treated equally and the insurance companies will no longer have the ability to drop any plan member if they get sick (Cara, 2012). This act provides shield to citizens that would normally be side-lined in such scenarios by the insurance companies

Americans aging 19-25 will be covered by their parents

About thirty one million Americans that are aged between 19-25 can be added to their parent’s insurance plans. According to statistics, a lot of the youths in this category are employed but still cannot afford to pay for the health benefits provided (William, 2010). This act will surely benefit them since they will be enabled to enjoy their parental health benefits.

Addition of the poor to the health programme

According to the federal government, this act will add the group of the less fortunate or people who cannot afford health insurance. The federal government will have to pay for them to be included in the health programme (Vincent, 2010).

Higher taxes, lower deductions

This act states that, all American citizens that do not pay for any insurance cover, do not qualify for Medicaid and they will be evaluated a tax of$95 which is same as 1% of the income in the year 2014 (Viola, 2013). She explains that the tax will be going up significantly to $325 which is 2% of income in 2015 and $695 that is 2.5% of income in 2016. It mainly says, people with higher income have to pay more in order to help earning lower income.

Cons

Drug cost will be higher

This act will make all pharmaceutical companies to pay more an extra of $84.8 billion in fees over in the next 10 coming years so as to cater for the finishing donut hole provided in the Medicare (Viola, 2013). Just in case the fees is transferred to the consumers, the price of drugs will be increased making it to cost more or making it expensive.

Healthcare professionals will not be enough

National monitor conducted a new study which predicted that if implementation of this act, and addition of the nation’s aging group, the results would be a lack of around 52000 primary care physicians by the year 2025 (William, 2010). This would risk leaving millions of American citizens with no access to proper healthcare. National monitor also predicted that visits to the primary care physicians will most probably have to increase from 462 million to 565 million by 2025. This will definitely strain the system.

Conclusion

After stating and analysing all the pros and cons of this act, my conclusion is that, this act is an improvement to our healthcare systems since the cons outweigh the pros. The intentions of this PPACA are attractive and something to be admired. It aims at making sure that health care is made available to all Americans by making it available. The problem of this act is that, it is very long and is somehow hard to understand the content of it. This make it hard for people to understand what some of the implications are. It is very crucial for every citizen to understand all the basics of the act in order to make a rightful and informed judgement.

PPACA primary goals are mainly to make the healthcare insurance available so as to cover all American with this health scheme. This will greatly reduce the cost of healthcare.it plans to achieve this through using mandates, introducing tax credits taxes and penalties and innovations.

References

Barkin, R. (2011). Small Steps to a Big Law. The American City & County. 126(5), 3.

Cara, W. L. (2012). Understanding Health Care Reform: Bridging the Gap between Myth and Reality. Health & Social Work. 37(3), 189-190.

Ed, B. (2010). Health care reform passes. The American City & County. 125(4), 10.

Vincent, M. (2010). Healthcare Reform. Long-Term Living. 59(5), 22-25.

Viola, R. (2013). The Patient Protection And Affordable Care Act: What Are the Facts, and When Do We Go From Here? Corrections Today. 75(5), 26-34.

William, S. M. (2010). Why The Affordable Care Act Needs A Better Name: ‘Americare’. Health Affairs. 29(8), 1496-1497.