Reforming healthcare

By Dr. Ananya Mandal, MDMar 18 2010

President Obama and his chief allies in Congress are at the final stages of structuring the historic year-long process of reforms in the health care legislation with changes in subsidies, taxes and assurance of better health care plans.

President Obama at an interview said, "It is going to be a vote for or against my health care proposal. That's what matters". "Somebody who votes for this bill, they're going to be judged at the polls. And the same is going to be true if they vote against it."

The plan

The benefits offered by the new package would be expansion of healthcare coverage to 31 million people, monitor the insurance company practices restricting coverage and begin to reduce health care costs.

Opting out

"The president is working it," said Rep. Ron Kind, D-Wis. He added that there was discussion on allowing people who disagree with the bill to opt out. "If people want an opt-out, give them an opt-out," Kind said. "But if they opt out, they don't qualify for any of the benefits in the bill." Kind also predicted that if such a provision were added, "the optics on this bill would change overnight. Suddenly people would be viewing it as, 'What would I be excluding myself from, what wouldn't I participate in,' instead of, 'This is a bad bill, and I don't want anything to do with it.' "

Endorsements

With the heated debates on the bill, whole populations are divided in their opinions with Business groups and insurers opposing the measure, and Catholic nuns added their voice to the other side.

Religious orders and social conservatives have provided an important new endorsement especially from Catholic nuns, including a group that says it represents more than 90% of the 59,000 nuns in the United States. That contrasted with the staunch opposition of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, which issued a statement arguing that the bill would not adequately guard against using federal funds for abortion. The nuns disagreed, and so did a retired bishop. And a senior antiabortion Democrat, Rep. Dale E. Kildee of Michigan, issued a statement announcing that he would support the bill.

"Let's get on with this," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said joining students to tout the legislation's benefits for young adults. The bill would also allow them to remain on their parents' policies until age 26.