ACA is one step on the way to better health

According to the partisans of the Democratic and Republican parties with the 2016 national election in their sights, the Affordable Care Act is an abject failure and an unimaginable success.

The task for the public is to tune out the hyperbole and pay greater attention to what is really happening on the health care front — that is, the performance of the Obama administration and Congress on the task of reining in health care costs.

Yes, 16 million more Americans have obtained coverage for their health care since the ACA was passed. The percentage of uninsured Americans has been reduced significantly.

And last Thursday’s U.S. Supreme Court decision upholding Obamacare made it possible for millions of Americans, including 155,000 Tennesseans, to keep tax credits that allow them to pay health insurance premiums for coverage purchased on the federal ACA exchange.

There is even renewed hope in Tennessee for the eventual passage of Insure Tennessee, Gov. Bill Haslam’s market-based plan to make affordable health care coverage available to about 280,000 low-income workers using $1.77 billion a year in federal funds.

The plan failed twice in the General Assembly this year.

But, as U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell says, there is “much more work to do.”

That would apply particularly to the task of lowering health care costs.

Buoyed by rising approval ratings in the polls and the favorable decision in the landmark Burwell vs. King case, the president spoke about the Affordable Care Act at a private event at Taylor Stratton Elementary School in Madison, Tennessee, Wednesday.

The president reminded his audience of the ACA’s Republican roots — a history that is often ignored by the president’s partisan critics on Obamacare.

And he touched on the cost issue during his appearance when a Mt. Juliet woman told him her health insurance company has proposed a substantial increase in her monthly premiums.

“I think the key for Tennessee is just making sure that the insurance commissioner does their job in not just passively reviewing the rates,” the president said. “... And my expectation is that they’ll come in significantly lower than what’s being requested.”

More generally, though, the administration must lead the way in tackling the costs that can be attributed to wasteful, redundant and inefficient health care practices, unhealthy lifestyles, the lack of preventive care, excessive prescription drug prices and the like.

The necessary shift from a system in which volume of care is rewarded to a system that rewards providers for producing healthier patients must be marked by transparency and persistence.

The Supreme Court’s reaffirmation of the Affordable Care Act was not the end of a process. It was a step on the way toward a healthier America.