In a living room discussion held Tuesday, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius heard stories from women who have benefited from the reforms brought about by the Affordable Care Act that currently faces a federal Supreme Court challenge.
Sebelius said she has had similar conversations with women throughout the country in Baltimore and Minneapolis because she said women are not only the majority of the country, but also the main consumers of healthcare. She added the majority of the beneficiaries from Medicare are women.
However, she said women are typically at the worst end of the current insurance market and are likely to have jobs where they are uninsured or underinsured. She said women often pay more for equal coverage in medical insurance.
Sebelius said women pay 15 to 40 percent more for the same insurance policies men have, and often those policies did not include the services women needed. She added they would have to pay more out-of-pocket for maternity coverage.
“Being a woman, right now, is a pre-existing condition in the health insurance market, and that would come to an end,” Sebelius said. “Certainly when issues like anything from C-sections to domestic violence are used as pre-existing condition limitations and insurance companies can charge for that or lock women out.”
Sebelius said the act would also extend coverage to those under the age of 26, and said because of that age extension more than 2.5 million young people are now covered by their parents’ insurance. She added 28,000 of those adults are in Wisconsin.
Meghan Ford, a University of Wisconsin student majoring in sociology and political science, also spoke at the discussion. She said before the Affordable Care Act passed, graduating in four years frightened her because she was uncertain whether she would be able to get insurance coverage or not.
However, she said having a plan she can rely on and stay on until age 26 will help her. Ford said she is graduating with almost $25,000 in student loans, and individual plans cost about $200 for an individual. She said combining that cost with rent and student loans repayment would have been a huge problem.
“Having more of those worries was just making me sicker and sicker, and being able to have that security … eased [my] whole hoard of anxieties and worries,” Ford said.
Also speaking in the discussion was Andrea Bonaparte, a UW student studying social work, who said the Affordable Care Act lifted a burden off her shoulders. She said she will not have to worry about health insurance and can focus on finding a job and career.
Sebelius also spoke about the act in Milwaukee. Republican Party spokesperson Ben Sparks said in a statement about the Milwaukee event that Wisconsin families have made it clear they do not support the act.
“We’re not surprised that the campaigner-in-chief is deploying his staff to swing states in order to defend his signature ‘accomplishment,’ Obamacare, which will only increase health costs for Wisconsin families, saddle our nation with more debt and increase the burden on Wisconsin job creators,” Sparks said.
