Affordable Health Care for America Act… kinda

Well it is official, congress has released a health care reform bill and it’s kinda, sorta, a little bit of what we were hoping it would be.

Nancy Pelsoi, along with a gaggle of Democrats, stood outside the capitol building this morning to unveil upon the world, their much touted Health Care bill. It’s not all bad, but it’s not the bill that progressives were hoping for. One major problem with the bill is that the single payer option is no where to be seen, although there was little doubt it would have been a part of the final package as it was taken off the table the moment negotiations began. An odd strategy for people who have the majority of Americans behind them.

The public option is, however, a part of the bill, even after it was loudly declared dead by the MSM. Although, it is not entirely the public option that many of us were hoping for and instead it comes across as a Frankenstein version of a good idea. The government will able to offer insurance to the 36 – 50 million Americans who have none, but they will have to negotiate with insurance providers in the first place – a move that is expected to cost an extra 85 billion dollars over the next 10 years. Medicare, a similar plan that many progressives where hoping for, does not require the government to negotiate with insurance providers, effectively allowing them to rope in costs and eliminate excess waste. Being that the bill will not be voted on immediately, there is still plenty of time to change this act, whether for the better of Americans or corporate ideals.

The Congressional Progressive Caucus had pushed hard for a “robust” public option that would have reimbursed providers using Medicare rates. Blue Dog Democrats beat back that effort, costing taxpayers $85 billion over ten years — money that will go to hospitals, doctors and drug makers, increasing the cost of health care.

The bill also prevents insurers from discriminating against people with preexisting conditions, caps the financial responsibility that insured individuals will face when medical emergencies strike, bans insurers for dropping folks because they get sick, and proposes a host of other insurance industry reforms.

It should be noted that the last line of that description of the bill is very important. Denying people, based on pre-existing conditions, has long been a boon to the insurance industry and been a major cause of fraud and misuse. Just recently a woman was denied coverage because her rape was seen as a pre-existing condition, as well as a woman who was beaten by her husband. The bill may not be what we had all hoped, but it makes a lot of important changes, hopefully meant to steer the insurance sector back to its main duty. Which is and has always been, the public well being.

You can read the entire Huffington Post article here.