ObamaCare, the name given to the Affordable care Act that was passed in 2010, has been facing a lot of opposition from the public and more so from Republicans, who have been trying to pass a repeal bill for the last five years. They were, however, able to pass the bill on Wednesday through a majority vote of 240 to 181, which speaker Paul Ryan says is a step towards getting better healthcare for the poor.
The bill, which the Democrats have been trying to prevent from being passed, would ensure that health care is more affordable and of higher quality compared to the current one, although it is expected that President Obama will not approve the move. “We are confronting the president with the hard, honest truth: ObamaCare doesn’t work,” said Speaker Paul Ryan on Wednesday after the bill was passed.
The main point of contingency, however, is on the fact that Republicans have never really come up with a working alternative to the ObamaCare, which means that their support from legislators and the public is limited. Democrats have dared Republicans to propose a similar bill that will help the over 16 million people who benefit from the ObamaCare program. They also highlighted that the repeal of the bill will mean that there will be 22 million fewer people who will be able to access affordable health insurance, which will place the development in this area a few steps back.“I’ve never been able to understand the great zeal to take healthcare away from people,” said Rep. Louise Slaughter.
According to Republicans, they will use this repeal bill to show people what they have to offer if they win the presidential elections later this year. This has received major criticism from Democrats,since up untilnow, they have not tabled a serious alternative. “If this were a serious effort, you’d at least have offered an alternative,” said Rep. Jim McGovern.
Speaker Ryan said that this time, they have a real plan to develop a much better alternative to ObamaCare and revealed that he had asked the committee chairman to come up with one plan from the many that had been presented to the House. However, when he was asked why the plan had not been presented during the vote, he said, “Just wait.”
Republicans really believe that this time, they will be able to do away with the ObamaCare Act, since, according to statistics, the public is not happy with it either. The move on Wednesday just goes a step further in proving their point.
Rep. Tom Price, who is a doctor, had criticized the ObamaCare program for its high deductibles. He added that as nice as it is that most people now have coverage, they still cannot afford proper health care due to the high premiums. “I get calls from my former physician colleagues almost weekly telling me that patients in their office are now electing not to get care because they can’t meet their deductible.”
The reconciliation bill awaiting the president’s signature does not scrape out the whole ObamaCare program, but it still does away with the most fundamental parts of the act,includingcutting off federal funding to Planned Parenthood for one year.
“We’ve been at this, what, for five years now, we finally found what I think is the smart strategy to be able to get a bill on [Obama’s] desk,” Ryan said on Tuesday night on Fox News’s “Hannity.”
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