Obamacare is everyone’s care

Rep. Joe Walsh’s crusade to defund the Affordable Care Act is ludicrous. He wants to eliminate the law that is already helping tens of thousands of his constituents — including his own family. After the representative decided to forgo his federal health insurance plan, health insurance companies refused to cover his wife because of her pre-existing condition. Despite firsthand knowledge of the failure of our current system, Rep. Walsh is still determined to repeal the ACA and force 32 million Americans who now will have access to health coverage back under the control of insurance companies — so they too can be denied coverage.

This is not the leadership we need to move our country forward. The people of the 8th District, like Tim Fraas of Elgin, deserve better. In 2008, Tim needed a $750,000 heart transplant. Even with good insurance, his family owes over $60,000 to the hospital. With the ongoing treatment he still requires, Tim could be in danger of hitting his lifetime benefit cap — and then what? Tim’s 24-year-old daughter, Amanda, would have already been dropped from their family coverage before the ACA, but Tim and his wife rest easy now knowing that she’ll have coverage until she graduates college and finds a job.

The ACA is not “Obamacare” — it’s Amandacare, it’s Timcare, it’s Everyonecare. Clearly, Rep. Walsh just doesn’t get it. He thinks defunding or repealing the ACA will somehow improve our health care system, but he’s wrong. The law is not perfect. And yes, we should work to make it better. But what we shouldn’t do is throw up our hands and throw it all away. The ACA is working for millions of Americans, and Congress should move forward instead of taking us back.

Jim Duffett

Executive director

Campaign for Better Health Care

Champaign