HEALTH REFORM: Feminist to address luncheon on Obamacare

For Loretta Ross, health care reform is personal.

The author, feminist and reproductive-rights advocate has insulin-dependent diabetes — and no health insurance. Without insulin, she could die.

Ross is looking forward to Oct. 1, when she and other Americans with pre-existing conditions can buy health insurance on exchanges set up by the Affordable Care Act.

On Thursday, Sept. 12, Ross, 60, of Atlanta, will discuss the importance of the Affordable Care Act at Planned Parenthood of Orange and San Bernardino Counties’ 7th Annual Empowerment Luncheon.

Less than two weeks before the sign-up period opens, many people still don’t understand what the Affordable Care Act means for them and their families, said Robert Armenta Jr., spokesman for the Planned Parenthood chapter.

“In fact, we just received a report that more than four in 10 Americans think the new healthcare law has been repealed, overturned in court or are just unsure whether it remains law,” he said.

That’s why the group invited Ross to speak at the luncheon, which benefits health-education programs in San Bernardino County.

Ross has worked on healthcare reform since the president first proposed it. The plan didn’t go as far as she would have liked, Ross said in a phone interview; she favored universal healthcare. “I will accept half a glass,” she said.

Most important to her was keeping abortion restrictions out of the plan and retaining access to contraception, she said. “We have not completely succeeded.”

Her home state, Georgia, resisted implementing the act and tried to roll back reproductive and contraceptive rights, she said.

But the efforts to undo reproductive rights have triggered a resurgence of feminism among younger women, awakening them from complacency, Ross said.

Inspiring young women to get involved and advocate for their rights is now the focus of Ross’ work. She retired last year after 38 years of managing and organizing feminist nonprofits.

Ross’s feminism dates to the 1970s when she was the director of the nation’s first rape crisis center.

Working there saved her life, she said. It helped her overcome the trauma of being kidnapped and raped at age 11 after she got separated from her Girl Scout troop at an amusement park.

She didn’t tell anyone at the time, she said, internalizing the crime and blaming herself for getting lost.

I asked her if an 11-year-old girl today would be more able to report being raped. Ross said it depends on whether there’s someone she can tell without fear of being punished.

Whenever Ross speaks publicly of the rape, women come up afterward and reveal their own sexual assaults they’ve kept secret since childhood, she said.

Educating and empowering girls to protect themselves is vital, Ross said: Even today, health classes focus on preventing disease and pregnancy rather than avoiding sexual assault.

The luncheon is at 11:30 a.m. at the Hilton Hotel, 285 E. Hospitality Lane, San Bernardino. Tickets are $45.

Cassie MacDuff

Press-Enterprise

California's working poor would lose a lot if health reform law dies

A bill to create a federally funded Basic Health Plan for about 720,000 low-income residents would go for naught if the Supreme Court tosses out the law.

If the healthcare reform law is thrown out by the U.S. Supreme Court — as many fear could happen based on the comments of conservative justices — more than 700,000 low-income Californians could lose a once-in-a-lifetime chance to obtain affordable health insurance.

At stake is what's known as a Basic Health Plan. This is a system provided for by the reform law, fully funded by the federal government, that would extend coverage to people who may not be able to afford conventional insurance policies but don't qualify for Medi-Cal.

 

State Sen. Ed Hernandez (D-West Covina), chairman of the Senate health committee, is the author of legislation that would create a Basic Health Plan in California beginning in 2014. It would provide coverage to about 720,000 people for as little as $30 a month.

But that's only if the reform law remains intact, providing up to $3 billion in federal funds needed annually to make the program a reality.

"If the court throws out the entire law, that's the nuclear option," Hernandez told me. "The Basic Health Plan would lose all funding. It's what I'm afraid of most."

Critics of the healthcare reform law focus primarily on its requirement that most people buy insurance or face a modest tax penalty, which is the trade-off for a separate requirement that insurers provide coverage to everyone, regardless of medical condition.

These critics seldom acknowledge other aspects of the law aimed at helping insure some of the roughly 50 million people in this country who now lack coverage.

That's an act of pure selfishness (even though we'd all benefit from having fewer people relying on emergency services for treatment). It's also a display of heartlessness unbefitting a country that claims to define itself by love-thy-neighbor Judeo-Christian values.

I wrote this month about another program in jeopardy, the Pre-Existing Condition Insurance Plan, or PCIP, which relies on nearly $350 million in federal funds to provide a safety net for Californians who have been turned away by private-sector insurers because of a medical disorder.

The PCIP is intended to protect such people until so-called insurance exchanges are created by the reform law in a couple of years. But if the Supreme Court rules the entire law unconstitutional, the exchanges would almost surely collapse and funding for PCIP would vanish.

Hernandez's Basic Health Plan faces the same prospect.

"The beauty of the plan is that it's completely funded by the federal government," he said. "When we can help this many people get access to the affordable, quality healthcare they need without putting additional strain on California's budget, we need to act."

Hernandez's bill, SB 703, would target people earning $30,000 to $46,000 a year. Such people would probably find the policies offered by insurance exchanges too pricey, although it remains to be seen how much coverage under the system would cost.

 

At the same time, these people would be largely ineligible for Medi-Cal because their incomes are above the near-poverty levels required by the program.

"The Basic Health Plan is coverage for the working poor," Hernandez explained.

The drafters of the healthcare reform law anticipated a need for such coverage, he said, because many people fall between the cracks of the existing healthcare system. So funding for Basic Health Plans was included in the law for any state choosing to establish such a program.

"It is clear, even at this early stage, that the BHP option deserves serious consideration by states seeking to provide their low-income residents with affordable and continuous coverage while improving state fiscal circumstances in 2014 and beyond," the nonpartisan Urban Institute concluded in a recent report.

Hernandez's bill creating a Basic Health Plan in California was approved by the state Senate last year. It's now making its way through the Assembly.

The key question before the Supreme Court, meanwhile, is whether Congress has the authority to impose a tax penalty if people choose not to buy health insurance.

Although many constitutional scholars say this power is well-established under a number of judicial precedents, the court's conservative justices made clear during three days of hearings that they think lawmakers may have overstepped.

Justice Antonin Scalia indicated that if the so-called mandate is ruled unconstitutional, the entire law would have to be scrapped. "My approach would be to say that if you take the heart out of this statute," he said, "the statute's gone."

With it would go the requirement that insurers provide family coverage to young people up to age 26, which has extended insurance to about 2.5 million people. With it would go the requirement that insurers cover anyone who applies, no questions asked.

With it would go the Pre-Existing Condition Insurance Plan, which is currently the only affordable way many people can obtain coverage. With it would go the exchanges that would provide a marketplace for millions of people who lack insurance.

And with it would go the Basic Health Plans that, as Hernandez observed, may be the only recourse for the working poor — people who are striving mightily to participate in the economic benefits of American society but all too frequently are left out in the cold.

The stakes are so very high.

Republican politicians can criticize the healthcare reform law all they want. But at least offer an alternative that accomplishes as much.

David Lazarus' column runs Tuesdays and Fridays. He also can be seen daily on KTLA-TV Channel 5. Send your tips or feedback to david.lazarus@latimes.com.

via LA Times