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By Abby Goodnough, May 25, 2014, Nytimes.com
Hospital systems around the country have started scaling back financial assistance for lower- and middle-income people without health insurance, hoping to push them into signing up for coverage through the new online marketplaces created under the Affordable Care Act.
The trend is troubling to advocates for the uninsured, who say raising fees will inevitably cause some to skip care rather than buy insurance that they consider unaffordable. Though the number of hospitals tightening access to free or discounted care appears limited so far, many say they are considering doing so, and experts predict that stricter policies will become increasingly common.
Driving the new policies is the cost of charity care, which is partly covered by government but remains a burden for many hospitals. The new law also reduces federal aid to hospitals that treat large numbers of poor and uninsured people, creating an additional pressure on some to restrict charity care.
Read the full story: www.nytimes.com
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Larry, what is interesting about all of this is that I have a friend who has just graduated from college. She voted for this president twice, boasting of the way he was going to make life better. People with and her family need healthcare, and because they are facing hard times, she believed that this direction was the correct one. However, she is just found out that although her mom is able to be on the ACA plan, she does not qualify because of her financial circumstances. The way that my friend put it was that "we are too poor for me to get on an ACA plan." She has friends who are in better financial circumstances, but for whatever reason, the ACA plans do not allow her to qualify.
ReplyDeleteHere is what is astonishing though: She still believes that this is the right way to go. When I asked her if there is a better way, she really has no idea. She is in the category of people who wants to believe that these policies are working, although they are clearly not... as seen in her own life.