Why the AHCA would have been bad for children — and an unavoidable truth moving forward

Follow me on Twitter @drClaire Last week the Republicans’ proposed replacement for the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare, failed to get the support it needed and was taken off the table. This is good news for children. Despite all the problems with health insurance generally and the ACA specifically, things are going pretty well for children when it comes to health insurance. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, currently 95% of children in the United States have health insurance, thanks to Medicaid, the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), and the ACA. The proposed replacement, called the American Health Care Act or AHCA, would have cut those numbers, especially the number covered by Medicaid. Currently about 40% of US children are covered by Medicaid, and have access to services (called Early Periodic Screening, Diagnosis, and Treatment, or EPSDT) specifically designed to get and keep them healthy from birth to adulthood. The proposed changes would have made fewer children eligible and would likely have led to fewer covered services, as states made difficult decisions as to what to do with less Medicaid funding. And with lower subsidies for the poor, many families with children simply may not have been able to afford insurance. Everyone is better off with health insurance, even healthy people — one car accident or fall down the stairs could lead to huge, possibly devastating, health care bills. But children (and women pregnant with those children) n...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Health Managing your health care Parenting Source Type: blogs