Today, the Washington Examiner published an op-ed written by AMAC President Rebecca Weber and Representative Daniel Webster (R-FL) on the importance of passing the Helping Everyone Access Long Term Healthcare (HEALTH) Act. This legislation would provide greater access to primary care for low-income Americans.
See excerpts below. Read the full op-ed here.
In a sharply divided Congress, Republicans and Democrats have an opportunity to cross party lines and address a tragic problem that has persisted for decades: Millions of people still cannot access a primary care physician.
Nationwide, roughly 92 million depend on Medicaid and the Children's Health Insurance Program, both of which lack sufficient access to primary care. Because many of these people cannot access a family doctor, they often forgo routine care and resort to the emergency room when an illness escalates. Forty-four percent of Medicaid patients, for example, visit the emergency room each year — almost four times the rate of patients with private insurance.
Expanding access to primary care is deeply important to both of us. Our effort to address this problem was inspired by a leader we both knew and loved: Dan Weber, the founder of the Association of Mature American Citizens, whose passion for this issue stemmed from an experience that broke his heart. When he took his child to the emergency room during a summer trip to upstate New York, he was shocked by the number of people waiting in the rural hospital. He started talking to people only to discover that many were there because they had no other choice. A number of primary care physicians had stopped seeing Medicaid patients.
Then, he witnessed something truly devastating. A young mother arrived whose baby had died from whooping cough, a respiratory infection that could have been treated if the mother had access to a pediatrician.
Dan never forgot that young mother and child, nor have we. Her story inspired the introduction of the Helping Everyone Access Long Term Healthcare, or HEALTH, Act, which was just reintroduced last week.
To increase access to primary care physicians, the HEALTH Act provides doctors with an option to receive a tax deduction for pro-bono medical care. Under the current system, the administrative costs of applying for Medicaid or CHIP reimbursements are so high that many doctors opt out of the program.
For primary care visits alone, eliminating layers of administrative costs would save taxpayers an estimated $2.8 billion annually. Even more astounding: If just 7 million of the roughly 20 million emergency room visits by Medicaid recipients became nonhospital visits, it would save an estimated $6.5 billion in taxpayer dollars.
Act Today! Tell Your Congressman to Cosponsor the HEALTH Act!
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