For nearly 100 years, Presidents from both parties tried – and failed – to reform America’s broken health care system. That all changed one year ago, when President Obama signed his administration’s historic health insurance reform legislation into law. The Affordable Care Act makes coverage more affordable for families and small businesses, extends coverage to 32 million uninsured Americans, ends the worst abuses of the insurance industry, strengthens and improves Medicare and reduces the deficit.
While President Obama, Democrats in Congress and around the country work to implement the law, Republicans continue to stand against progress and play political games by trying to repeal and defund reform. If they were to succeed, their actions would increase our budget deficit, hurt working families who are just starting to emerge from the recession and hand the keys to the American health care system back to the giant insurance companies.
365 days after enactment, Marylanders are already seeing the benefits from the Affordable Care Act and the new protections provided by it:
$829 Million |
Amount of money health care reform is expected to save MD taxpayers over the next decade |
350,000 |
Number of Marylanders who will get coverage – reducing the number of uninsured by half |
1.01 Million |
Number of families that will receive tax credits and other assistance |
3,700,000 |
Number of Marylanders who won’t have lifetime limits on healthcare benefits |
129 |
Number of community clinics that will be supported in Maryland |
2,500,000 |
Number of Maryland residents who have a pre-existing condition and won’t be denied coverage |
$69.5 Million |
Total grant funding to MD for insurance exchanges, IT innovations, and aging centers |
Watch this video which features Vice President Biden who recognized one year ago that health reform was a BFD and showcases the long journey to reform and how the bill is already helping so many:
If you’re over sixty five, the Affordable Care Act provides you with more control over your own health care and strengthens Medicare.
More than 700,000 senior citizens in Maryland are now eligible for preventive services at no cost – including mammograms, diabetes screenings and flu shots – and free annual wellness exams. By making preventive care free – the law allows seniors to see their physicians more regularly, catch symptoms and conditions early and stay in better health.
Under the drug plan passed by President Bush and Republicans in Congress, thousands of Maryland seniors were left with a gap in coverage that required them to pay the full cost of prescriptions or go without the necessary medicine. After Democrats passed health care reform, 48,167 seniors got a $250 check to help pay for their prescriptions and they’ll receive a 50% discount on brand-name drugs this year.
Senator Ben Cardin spoke on the floor of the U.S. Senate highlighting how healthcare reform is having an “immediate impact on real families, small businesses and seniors in Maryland.” Senator Cardin is definitely right when he says that Marylanders and all Americans “have a reason to celebrate” the one-year anniversary of the Affordable Care Act.
Watch his statement here:
On Sunday night, the House of Representatives voted to pass comprehensive health care reform for all Americans and today President Obama signed it into law. The fight to provide access to quality, affordable health care to all Americans has been 100 years in the making, and today we made that longtime goal a reality. As a result, health care will be more affordable for American families and businesses, 32 million more Americans who didn’t have access to coverage will get it (taking a large burden off insured Americans), and patients – not insurance companies – will have control over their health care.
From day one, Americans will see benefits from this bill. For example, starting immediately, many small businesses will receive tax credits to make coverage more affordable for their employees. This bill immediately helps to close the “donut hole” that left so many seniors without prescription drug coverage. Seniors will now receive a $250 rebate to cover some of those costs, and that amount will increase in the future. Also this year, parents can cover their children up to the age of 26 and there will be a new ban on lifetime coverage limits. Please visit my website (hoyerforcongress.com) to see a full list of benefits that will increase your control over your care.
Over the next few years, there will be even more positive benefits – including the creation of a competitive, transparent marketplace where individuals and small businesses can pool together to buy private insurance at low rates.
I am proud of the work that the President and Congress did to make this bill into law. It will create a more prosperous, more just future—a future we can be proud to hand our children.
Steny Hoyer represents the 5th Congressional District of Maryland and is the Majority Leader of the U.S. House of Representatives.
