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Current Critical Polices of the Affordable Care Act

Sarah Marquez
HCA 600
March 27, 2014

Obama signed The Affordable Care Act in March 2010. Through a series of
extensions and revisions, the multiple laws that together form the federal legal framework for
this act were established. The Act establishes the basic legal protections that until now have been
absent; a near-universal guarantee of access to affordable health insurance coverage, from birth
through retirement is the overall goal of the Act (Rosenbaum 2011). The Affordable Care Act or
ACA brings many new changes to the forefronts of healthcare. Full implementation occurred on
January 1, 2014, when the individual and employer responsibility provisions took effect, state
health insurance Exchanges began to operate, the Medicaid expansions also took effect, and the
individual and small-employer group subsidies began to flow (Rosenbaum 2011). Another
important new change that affects the new health care policy is the fulfillment of coverage to all,
even with pre-existing conditions. The Act will allow uninsured individuals opportunity to
become insured without denial. The law will result in health insurance coverage for about 94%
of the American population, reducing the uninsured by 31 million people, and increasing
Medicaid enrollment by 15 million beneficiaries (Rosenbaum 2011). With the increased
opportunity to enroll in healthcare, there will be a high demand for usage. Access, quality and
cost will all play an important role in how we utilize and obtain healthcare in the future.
Under The ACA, millions of uninsured individuals can now be insured, but do they all
really become insured. The ACA does not guarantee everyone will be insured and have access.
Approximately 24 million people are expected to remain without coverage (Rosenbaum 2011).
This may be because they choose not to, or they still cant access it with the increased
government assistance. I think this will always be a challenge. How can effective systems of care
be created to protect these individuals and the communities in which they live from the
consequences of inadequate health-care access?

Other important parts of the ACA policy are the quality of the healthcare coverage that
will be received under this act and the cost. Quality and cost are both very different variables but
they both effect each other. One of the aims of the ACA is to improve the fairness, quality, and
affordability of health insurance coverage (Rosenbaum 2011). This can be seen by how the act
ensures that even individuals with pre-existing conditions will not be denied. Also, the ACA aims
to improve health-care value, quality, and efficiency while reducing wasteful spending and
making the health-care system more accountable to a diverse patient population (Rosenbaum
2011).

References
Fostin, P, Roebuck, C Health Care Spending after Adopting a Full-Replacement, HighDeductible Health Plan With a Health Savings Account: A Five-Year Study.
Employee Benefit Research Institute. July 2013 No. 388
High Deductible Health Plan. (2014). Retrived March 21, 2014, from
https://www.healthcare.gov/glossary/high-deductible-health-plan/
Shi, Leiyu, Singh, Douglas Delivering Healthcare in America. A Systems Approach