Healthcare Policy and Law: Impact & Analysis of Affordable Care Act

This essay provides an analysis of healthcare policy and law, focusing primarily on the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and its implications for the United States. It discusses the ACA's goals of improving accessibility, quality, and affordability of healthcare, while also addressing the challenges and conflicts between a free market healthcare system and a single-payer government system. The essay examines the health insurance exchange in Alabama, highlighting the role of the federal government and the entry of new insurers. It also touches upon innovations by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), such as the special wheelchair and new prosthetic technology. Furthermore, the essay explores the connection between poverty in developing countries and the lack of proper economic policies and public service control, suggesting potential solutions through foreign investments and corruption-free public services.

Running head: HEALTHCARE POLICY AND LAW
Healthcare Policy and Law
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author note

1HEALTHCARE POLICY AND LAW
Discussion 1)
The Affordable Health Care Act is the most essential care legislation in US since the
creation of Medicare and Medicaid in 1965 (Hilgeman et al. 2016). At the same time, the
reformation was designed to improve the accessibility, quality of the services and the
affordability. It has to be also noted that the healthcare costs had risen rapidly for decades
because of the economical changes. Two examples negative outcome of this inclined changes
can be found from the current social infrastructure. Ten millions of Americans were
uninsured after the initial imposition of Affordable Care Act, which clearly indicates the
importance of the reformation. As another example the declination of uninsured population
can be considered. In 2009 the uninsured population was 43% that came to 9.1% in 2015
(Sommers et al. 2016). It clearly indicates the accessibility and the political compatibility of
this reformation.
The conflicts of a free market healthcare system and single payer government system
can be conceptualised with a monopoly and oligopoly market agreement in healthcare
provision. A singly system, where government will bureaucrats will only cause long wait
time and limited services. As an example, the post office can be considered, where lack of
competition is continuously reducing the potential service quality and consumer satisfaction.
As another example, the winter’s serious flu epidemic of Britain can also be taken, here the
single player system has completely field to provide adequate infrastructure (Mechanic,
2015). Therefore, there should be no doubt on choosing a competitive healthcare market over
government bureaucracy. Hence, a competitive market where government could impose
pricing and administrative policies can provide better choice and affordability to the citizens.
Discussion 2)

2HEALTHCARE POLICY AND LAW
When it comes to the health insurance exchange in the state of Alabama only federaly
facilitated marketplace is seen. Almost all the health exchange plans have been done through
Healthcare.gov. At the same time, before 2017 Blue Cross Blue Shield was the only
insurance carrier of this state and now after 2018 the residents in Birmingham area can
choose from two different insurers. Bright Health is now offering many beneficial exchange
plans in that area with two special exchange plan for extended area surrounding the state.
Besides the premiums are going to be lower in 2019 by 0.5% depending on the plan (Jones,
Bradley and Oberlander 2014). Therefore, from two of these examples, it can be clearly
identified that federal government handled the rate review process better than the prior
situation.
The two major innovations that the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has started
are the special wheelchair in 2015 and the new prosthetic technology on 2014
(healthinsurance.org 2018). The invented wheelchair allows cranking up the push rims to
standing position to provide additional functionality and independence. In many healthcare
organizations in Birmingham and the areas of extended Alabama, this technology is under
regular operation and is also showing huge success. The new prosthetic technology helps to
restore the sense of touch. This technology is currently used for the patients who have lost
their upper limb.
Discussion 3)
One of the most essential reasons behind the extreme poverty in many developing
countries is lack of proper economical policies and public service control due to political
turmoil. In most the developing countries, the people still segregated them in different
political supporters rather focusing on the holistic growth of the nation. Lack of political
stability causes financial clustering and lack of development of public services like education,

3HEALTHCARE POLICY AND LAW
healthcare and security. Due to poor infrastructure governments need fewer workforces to
control their very limited facilities. Lack of workforce demand causes very high
unemployment rate and poor economical growth. Many changes are needed to alter the
present situation of global poverty that involves political, social, economical alteration.
Making scope for foreign investments while equally facilitating the public services
holistically can change the current scenario of unemployment (Alvaredo and Gasparini 2015).
Corruption free public services and provisions including healthcare, education, and security
should be developed to open scope for proper financial distribution while making enough
affordability for all citizens. Prioritising healthcare necessities is also helpful to develop
sustainable health and wellbeing of the society.

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Reference
Alvaredo, F. and Gasparini, L., 2015. Recent trends in inequality and poverty in developing
countries. In Handbook of income distribution (Vol. 2, pp. 697-805). Elsevier.
healthinsurance.org 2018. Alabama health insurance marketplace: history and news of the
state’s exchange: Obamacare enrollment. [online] healthinsurance.org. Available at:
https://www.healthinsurance.org/alabama-state-health-insurance-exchange/ [Accessed 7 Jan.
2019].
Hilgeman, M.M., Mahaney‐Price, A.F., Stanton, M.P., McNeal, S.F., Pettey, K.M., Tabb,
K.D., Litaker, M.S., Parmelee, P., Hamner, K., Martin, M.Y. and Hawn, M.T., 2016.
Alabama Veterans Rural Health Initiative: a pilot study of enhanced community outreach in
rural areas. The Journal of Rural Health, 30(2), pp.153-163.
Jones, D.K., Bradley, K.W. and Oberlander, J., 2014. Pascal's Wager: health insurance
exchanges, Obamacare, and the Republican dilemma. Journal of Health Politics, Policy and
Law, 39(1), pp.97-137.
Mechanic, D., 2015. Seizing opportunities under the Affordable Care Act for transforming
the mental and behavioral health system. Health Affairs, 31(2), pp.376-382.
Sommers, B.D., Buchmueller, T., Decker, S.L., Carey, C. and Kronick, R., 2016. The
Affordable Care Act has led to significant gains in health insurance and access to care for
young adults. Health affairs, 32(1), pp.165-174.