Enrollment for Affordable Care Act opens
“Obamacare” is a heavily-loaded phrase many health care myths are attached to. Some common pieces of misinformation about the act is that the medical community is against it, young adults will be driven to bankruptcy and it’s a government takeover of health care, according to Dr. Scott Poppen, the Utah State director for Doctors for America.
“I think that there’s a huge amount of confusion among the population in general, probably even more so for the younger population about what this all involves,” Poppen said. “Even physicians are confused about it.”
The Affordable Care Act was signed by President Barack Obama on March 23, 2010. Since then a number of features included in the law have gone into effect, including free preventive services for people receiving Medicare.
Oct. 1 marks the beginning of open enrollment for the health insurance marketplace in each state.
Affecting USU Students
Kennedy Tripp is a 29-year-old student at USU in his junior year of studying business. After working for Obeo Professional Real Estate Photography Services for six years, a company that offered him health care insurance, Tripp was laid off and returned to Cache Valley to finish school.
Tripp recently turned to Avenue H – the marketplace for health insurance in Utah – to purchase health care for the first time.
“If you don’t have health insurance through your parents or through your job, this is where you go to choose health insurance,” Tripp said. “I chose it based on which plan offered partner benefits and it was the only plan at the time.”
Tripp and his partner Mark Overocker, a 26-year-old sophomore studying nursing, are in a legal domestic partnership and decided to purchase insurance from Blue Cross Blue Shield based on its partner benefits.
Tripp and Overocker were involved in an auto accident on July 31 that caused their truck to roll four times. Each of them was billed $20,000, and their insurance benefits didn’t start until Aug. 1.
“There’s no way to get around that,” Tripp said. “However, our insurance is not allowed to remove us because of pre-existing conditions. Before this, it was just allowed. ‘Oh we see you’re diagnosed with cancer, we’re kicking you off our insurance.’ This is a huge benefit.”
Misconceptions
Poppen said the most common misconception he hears is Obamacare is a government takeover of health care.
“Marketplaces are basically run through private insurances,” Poppen said. “When you buy a plan on the marketplace, it’s going to be private health insurance like you would otherwise. It’s hard for me to see how this is a government takeover.”
Poppen recently viewed an advertisement video by Generation Opportunity depicting a young woman receiving a pelvic exam – not from a doctor but from an Uncle Sam character representing the government.
“The idea that when I’m with you in an exam room, that Obamacare and the ACA makes any sort of difference in what goes on in an exam, is absolutely ludicrous,” Poppen said.
Similar to buying auto insurance, one of the requirements of the Affordable Care Act is that every citizen becomes insured.
Educating young adults and students is a movement that Doctors for America is passionate about – especially concerning fines that can be given.
The fine for not being insured in relatively low for 2014 – $95, but by 2016 it will be raised to $695. For a lot of students and young adults, it will be cheaper to buy their own insurance than to pay the fine.
“Life tragedies can occur like the big car accident,” Tripp said. “I’m just a student going to school, yet big things occur without you knowing it.”
Services not previously covered-and other benefits
One of the biggest benefits of the ACA, not only for students and young adults but for all citizens, is that companies may not discriminate based on pre-existing conditions – like Tripp’s auto accident.
“I’ve seen a young person with a $10,000 deductible with cancer,” Poppen said. “They don’t cover pregnancy, mental health or substance abuse. Insurance that will be available now covers all of those things.”
He said there’s also no financial cap on the insurance and coverage will be available in all major health areas.
Twitter: @daniellekmanley