The push for health care reform is moving fast and furiously, so I thought it’d be helpful to have semi-daily “Health on the Hill” updates that should help you keep track of the reform debate and get to the meat of the issue. Enjoy!
Today’s Updates – 10/29/09:
Today marked a big day in the health care reform journey that we have all been on this year, and it was an even bigger day for those that have been fighting this fight for decades. The House of Representatives released their health care bill today — and made quite the production of it, with Speaker Pelosi and about half of the Democratic Caucus entering the stage of the press conference to U2 blaring over the loud speakers. Standing there on the stage behind these proud Members of Congress filing in to Bono made me think about what a special day for celebration it was, while simultaneously thinking about how oddly comical politics can be sometimes. As Representatives danced their way to their seats, and Pelosi took the podium, the tone of this significant announcement settled down and focused on the real reasons why we were all there: to ensure health care coverage for those that need it, make insurance affordable for everyone and stop the horrible practices of the insurance companies.
Along with many Representatives that spoke on the various provisions included in the bill, such as the long-debated public option and strong affordability measures, constituents from each of their districts shared their personal hardships with our current health system. One such story almost knocked me off of the stage. A mother of three triplets that were conceived by In Vitro Fertilization was denied health insurance based on a claim that she had a pre-existing condition of “infertility”, and her husband was denied coverage based on “spousal infertility” as a pre-existing condition. These are the kinds of ridiculous practices that will now be illegal.
The House bill will not only end denials based on pre-existing conditions, gender, age or income, but it will insure 96% of the population, expand Medicaid to more low-income Americans, offer a health insurance exchange in which plans can be purchased, including a public plan provided by the government (the public option), and it will reduce the deficit by $30 billion over the first ten years. This bill came out to be pretty strong — We’ll just have to see whether the public option stays in the bill on its journey from the House floor to Conference (when the House and Senate bills are merged), and if it does remain in the final legislation, how many people will really have access to it. As it stands now, the Congressional Budget Office has said that only about 6 million people would gain insurance through the public option included in this new House legislation.
However, one of the biggest victories in the bill for our generation — the Millenial generation of young adults ages 18-34– was the provision to extend coverage under our parents’ insurance plan up to our 27th birthday. This provision comes at no cost to taxpayers and is just a common sense solution to ensuring coverage for young adults.
All in all it was a happy day for health care and a reminder that we still have a journey ahead of us as we await the CBO score for the Senate bill and look forward to both chambers hashing it out on the floor to debate their legislation and get us one step closer to a strong bill for health care reform.
However, the House is always an entirely different cup of tea than the Senate..so a bumpy road may still lie ahead!