The healthcare reforms enacted recently brings huge changes the way consumers look at health insurance—from being optional necessity, it changes to obligatory accessory.
There are fines and penalty if consumers do not buy health insurance to save them from financial insecurities and availing needed healthcare services. At the same time,
the government is providing lots of benefits and programs to facilitate the implementation of this Act.
The benefits and facilities can be categorized in regional to ethnic categories. In this context, we take a broad look at the immediate benefits that the consumers in Florida will get with the implementation of this Act:
1. The Act offers benefits to the Medicare beneficiaries hitting the donut hole of gap in Medicare Part D drug coverage. The new law continues to provide additional discounts for seniors on Medicare in the years ahead and closes the donut hole by 2020.
2. All the Medicare enrolees in Florida will be provided preventive services, including, colorectal cancer screenings, mammograms, and an annual wellness visit without copayments, coinsurance, or deductibles.
3. Florida has an access to $351 million dollars provided by the federal government to provide coverage for uninsured residents with pre-existing medical conditions through a new Pre-Existing Condition Insurance Plan program. This program will be converted to State Exchange in 2014.
4. Small businesses in Florida with fewer than 25 employees may check their eligibility to avail credits for offering health insurance to their employees.
5. Children in Florida will be able to stay in their family health insurance as dependents till the age of 26 years. This undoubtedly is one of the most prominent clauses that will affect the individual health insurance market directly. In fact, student health insurance market will also be impacted with this.
6. For the very first time, Florida has the option of Federal Medicaid funding for coverage for all low-income populations, irrespective of age, disability, or family status.
7. Insurance companies will not be allowed to place a lifetime limit on the coverage they provide to the consumers. This clause definitely provides a lot of protection to the consumers in Florida.
8. Further to this protection, insurance companies in Florida will not be allowed to drop people from coverage when they get sick. Individual health insurance market in Florida will be greatly benefited from this clause.
Like this, there are lots of other benefits that are available to the residents of Florida and also to various other states. The main aim of the healthcare reforms is to make health insurance more accessible and effective for the consumers. To achieve this goal, though the Act has mandated its purchase, it also brings in new laws and enforcements that will help protecting the rights of consumers. So, even if we analyze the situation independently, we can deny the benefits of the Affordable Care Act out rightly saying that it is forcing on the fundamental rights of consumers in deciding whether they want to buy a product or not.
