Affordable Health Care Act

The Affordable Health Care Act: A solution that addresses the importance of health promotion and non-communicable disease prevention in a globalizing world economy.

According to the World Health Organization, health encompasses the direct and indirect factors that affect physical, mental, and social well-being, which includes the ability to function within the context of the political, economic, social, environmental, cultural, ecological, agricultural, demographical, scientific research, ethical, and technological spheres that influence individuals and the factions in which they reside.1 Departing from a traditional medical perspective, this conceptualization transcends the paradigm that health is merely the absence of disease, injury,
Citing the eradication of hunger, increasing access to education, promotion of gender equality, and environmental sustainability as important aspects on the international front, these Millennium Development Goals, that are indirectly related to health, arguably call for broad, multisectoral policy-level interventions by the United States government for its own people. Of the eight Millennium Development Goals, three are directly related to improving health including: the improvement of child health, the improvement of maternal health and the reduction of infectious diseases. Again, for each of these three Millennium Development Goals that are directly related to health to be realized, governmental support of both funding and a solid infrastructure are necessary for a solid foundation that supports healthy Americans across all ages, races, genders, and ability levels. With the implementation of the Affordable Health Care Act of 2010, provisions for policies to govern support such a foundation have become a reality for the United States government and the American public as a
The growth in the prevalence and incidence of non-communicable diseases and preventable deaths in the United States has illuminated, in part, the barriers to health that are inherent in American society. Cost, accessibility and an emphasis on treatment of disease symptoms are the most noted obstacles to the achievement of healthy Americans. The Affordable Care Act of 2010 (and other similar policies related to public health) appears to be a response to these issues of practicality. Furthermore, the Affordable Care Act is a representation of the paradigm shift noted in the above paragraph. Traditional ways of understanding health patterns are challenged by the solutions offered by the Affordable Care Act for transitions in disease patterns “with a vibrant emphasis on disease prevention… through a wide array of new initiatives and funding”.2 In fact, authors Koh and Sebelius of the article Prevention and the Affordable Care Act, hail the Affordable Care Act as a vehicle that will usher ‘prevention’ into the American schema of health and wellness.