Zachary Fitzgerald
Health care reform in the United States should be focused on making sure patients receive the insurance coverage they need while also lowering the high cost of premiums, U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy said Thursday in Morgan City.
The St. Mary Chamber of Commerce hosted a meeting with Cassidy at South Central Louisiana Technical College’s Young Memorial Campus.
Cassidy, R-Baton Rouge, said he cares deeply about health care reform and sponsored the Patient Freedom Act of 2017, which he introduced to the Senate in January. The bill has become known as the “Cassidy-Collins Plan.” U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, is among the bill’s co-authors.
Cassidy, a physician who worked 25 years in Louisiana’s charity hospital system, has talked to insurers, doctors, employers, pharmaceutical companies and patients over the years about health care issues.
His bill includes Medicaid reform that makes enrollment easier by automatically enrolling patients who qualify for the health care program for low-income Americans. The bill also gives states the flexibility to customize health care regulations.
During the 2016 presidential campaign, Donald Trump pledged that he would continue health insurance coverage people already had, care for people with pre-existing conditions, eliminate mandates and lower premiums. Cassidy says his legislation should affirm Trump’s campaign pledge.
The Affordable Care Act, commonly known as Obamacare, was signed into law in 2010 and caused many Americans’ health insurance premiums to skyrocket with some families paying in the $20,000 to $40,000 range per year on premiums alone, Cassidy said.
“The Affordable Care Act has become the Unaffordable Care Act,” he said.
“We have to make enrolling easy. Under the Affordable Care Act, it was too hard, and people didn’t do it,” Cassidy said.
Congress should pass legislation that lowers premiums and passes “the Jimmy Kimmel test,” by giving people with pre-existing conditions “adequate coverage,” Cassidy said.
Last month, Cassidy came out in support of a plea to Congress from late night talk show host, Kimmel.
Kimmel asked legislators to ensure that Americans aren’t denied health insurance because of pre-existing conditions, which are health problems that existed before a patient began receiving coverage under a particular insurance plan.
Kimmel made that plea after revealing that his infant son was diagnosed with a heart condition.
On May 4, the House of Representatives passed the Affordable Health Care Act, legislation meant to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. The Senate will likely “do a significant rework” of the Affordable Health Care Act, Cassidy said.
“Folks have been voting for politicians who have said they wanted to repeal and replace Obamacare,” Cassidy said. “The Affordable Care Act actually has things in it that people like.”
Among the popular parts of Obamacare are provisions to allow children to stay on their parents’ health insurance until they’re 26 years old and provide coverage to people with pre-existing conditions, Cassidy said.
Obamacare’s unpopularity stems, in part, from the mandates.
“People in the United States don’t like the federal government telling them what to do,” Cassidy said.
The employer mandate required that businesses provide health insurance for full-time employees. But, if employers couldn’t afford to pay for insurance, they made full-time workers into part-time workers, he said.
For any legislation to endure in the long-term, it must be passed with bi-partisan support, Cassidy said.
“You can arguably say that the Affordable Care Act never had Republican buy-in, so now we’re still fighting that,” he said. “I do think whatever we come up with as an alternative should have buy-in from both sides.”