USA Today: After one year, health law already offers lifelines

[dennis4868]

A year ago, the parents of a little girl in Ohio were worrying that they would soon exceed the lifetime limit on their health insurance. Taylor Wilhite had been diagnosed with leukemia at age 8, and her treatment — rounds of chemotherapy, a bone marrow transplant, long hospital stays — had been stupendously expensive.

"No one tells you that you have a cap" on coverage, says Amy Wilhite, Taylor's mother. When a social worker warned the Wilhites that they should check, they learned their limit was $1 million. By then, they had spent $770,000. Taylor's father's company managed to negotiate the maximum up to $1.5 million, but Taylor's oncologist said the cost of her care could hit $3 million to $4 million. "I was just frantic," Amy says. As the cap got closer, the Wilhites began to put off care for conditions that weren't life-threatening, but the bills kept mounting. "The cost of medicine, you just wouldn't believe," says Amy. And hospital room charges — "you'd think she was in a resort."

The options for people near the limit weren't pretty. Cancel all but essential treatment, scramble for charity care, or contemplate bankruptcy. But then came a reprieve. The health reform legislation, which President Obama signed into law a year ago today, contained a provision that barred insurance companies from setting lifetime limits.

The entire article is here....http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/2011-03-23-editorial23_ST_N.htm#

I understand many here are not happy because the HCR was not perfect. But it was certainly a great start and is saving lives (including my daughter's life). SO THANK YOU PRESIDENT OBAMA AND DEMS IN CONGRESS. As Obama said in 2008, change happens in baby steps and is not easy (especially with the congress we have). People here tend to not want to remember that and hold Obama accountable for something he warned everyone about - change takes time. He is also blamed by many liberals for the faults and weaknesses of congress.

[liberal N proud]

1. Lifelines the Teabaggers and GOPers want to take away

[dennis4868]

2. SO THAT....

they can give more tax cuts to their wealthy friends.... :-(

[lsewpershad]

3. Sometimes

it takes some people to learn only from their own experiences. Maybe that is the way of these republicans and teabaggers. Not wishing them ill. but......

[TheKentuckian]

4. Unrecced for the use of the false and silly "perfect" meme.

When you are talking a bill that leaves a monopolistic anti-trust exemption in place, taxes benefits, and mandates most individuals purchase a for profit product sold on the market solely at the discretion of their employers with no price controls then you are so far from "perfect" or ideal as to need to catch a flight to get within eye shot.

That little "perfect" barb is pretty damn dismissive and your story would have more positive impact if you could avoid slamming those that take issue with the effort while illustrating that real life good is in there regardless of where you stand on it but instead you celebrate getting yours and essentially scoff at millions who will be enslaved to the will of their employers or will be forced to purchase a for profit product they can't afford to use.

That said, I came across a very sick child with a paltry ass half million dollar lifetime benefit that just one of her medications will run out before she is in her mid 20's so I know first hand how much relief this will bring to certain people even as it puts a structural squeeze on everyone's benefits.

Features cannot trump structure, no matter how welcome the feature is but at least there is some limited relief. Certainly, your definition of perfection has an astronomically lower threshold than mine.

Perfect means flawless. I don't expect such from the work of men and in this case we didn't even get reform but rather a reenforcement of the existing system with a few features (that we will pay full value for either in cash or taxes) use as a marketing tool.