Healthcare
Exhibit: Sound as North Carolina Politics
Referenced Sounds
A major goal of the Affordable Care Act was for uninsured Americans to sign up for subsidized insurance plans via government insurance websites. Although North Carolina refused to participate in the ACA, citizens were still able to go online and register at www.healthcare.gov. In fact, by January 2014, 107,778 North Carolinians had signed up for one of these insurance policies. (1)
Healthcare costs- paying doctors and hospitals, buying prescription medications, etc- are incredibly expensive without insurance. However, not all North Carolinians can afford to purchase insurance policies. Under the ACA, individuals were to be subsidized based on income. Those with incomes below a certain level were to receive Medicaid under the new expansion. But because North Carolina didn't expand Medicaid, 318,710 citizens are left with no means to purchase insurance. These are the people that traditional Medicaid leaves out: childless, non-disabled adults below 138% of poverty level who are too poor to purchase insurance plans on their own. These people make up 28% of North Carolina's uninsured population. (2)
I walked up to a healthcare provider at a Planned Parenthood table and asked, "What happens if an uninsured person gets sick or hurt and requires healthcare or hospitilization? How do they pay?" She explained to me that hospitals and emergency rooms are required by law to give care to the uninsured. Medicaid funds are paid to hospitals afterward as reimbursement for this care, yet another reason that many healthcare providers feel Medicaid should be expanded. (2)
Republicans in Raleigh, including North Carolina's Gov. McCrory, are generally against Medicaid because they see Medicaid as too expensive and don't want to expand an already large goverment program. However, by refusing to expand Medicaid, there are thousands of North Carolinians left without access to healthcare. This policy issue is also a moral issue because it raises the question: "Do all North Carolinians have the right to affordable healthcare?" If the answer is yes, then many would say that North Carolina isn't meeting a moral obligation to its citizens under the current system.