To the editor:
In January, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said this about the Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare:
“What you need to understand is that there are 25 million Americans who aren’t covered now. If the idea behind Obamacare was to get everyone covered, that’s one of the many failures. In addition to premiums going up, co-payments going up, deductibles going up. And many Americans who actually did get insurance when they did not have it before have really bad insurance that they have to pay for, and the deductibles are so high that it’s really not worth much to them. So it is chaotic. The status quo is simply unacceptable.”
I agree with this critique, and Congress has a responsibility to see that the situation is ameliorated if not solved. But the proposals from House and Senate Republicans do not seek to solve these problems -– ones pointed out by Sen. McConnell himself –- they exacerbate them.
The bill Senate Republicans are proposing will lead to more people not being covered. Their premiums, deductibles and co-pays -– the portion people actually pay for care — will jump. More people will end up in bad insurance plans that have deductibles so high that they really are not worth much to them.
Republicans title their bill “The Better Care Act.” In truth it’s a prescription for disaster.
Richard Gotshall
Franklin
