Ethical Issues In Obamacare

Change, Effectiveness and Ethicality
Since its implementation, The Affordable Care Act has alleviated numerous burdens for people with disabilities. Before Obamacare, people with disabilities were regularly at a disadvantage with problems such as expensive medicine and no preventative services. According to WhiteHouse.gov, since the Affordable Care Act has been in place the prescription problem has been greatly relieved, “In 2010 and 2011, over 5.1 million seniors and people with disabilities on Medicare have saved over $3.1 billion on prescription drugs.” This means that many disabled people are not compelled to relinquish other necessities to pay for their medications. Next, thanks to deductibles and co-pays, many disabled people were not
According to the Department of Health and Human Services, “In 2015, due in part to the ACA, health care spending grew at the slowest rate on record (since 1960). Meanwhile, health care price inflation is at its lowest rate in 50 years.” In general, health care has been cheaper, all around. Obamacare is reported to cost $273.6 billion dollars per year and by 2025 Obamacare would have cost in total 1.207 trillion dollars (cnbc.com and the Congressional Budget Office). It took from February 24th ,2009 until June 28th, 2012, rather 1,220 days for Obamacare to pass through congress (cnn.com). Despite the Affordable Care Act taking years to go into effect and costing a great deal of money, it has helped tons of disabled people to live an easier and healthier life through being able to take the correct dosage of their medications, being able to participate in health screenings and not being discriminated against by health insurance companies. In short, though the Affordable Care Act has cost a lot of time and taken a bunch of effort, it has greatly helped the disabled populations and in that category it is
However, it can be viewed as encroaching on citizens’ rights to self-determination, since the law requires everyone to buy health care, if they want to or not. A quote from Anthony Vecchione’s article Debating the Ethical Implications of the Affordable Care Act, can further explain this accusation when it says, “Some critics of the ACA argue that the controversial individual mandate -- which requires American who meet certain criteria to purchase health insurance -- is unethical.” This goes to show that the particular problem people tend to have with the ACA is that citizens are forced to pay for certain resources, that one might view as unnecessary. Nonetheless, Dr. Sorrell sums up the ethics of the Affordable Care Act, and shows how now through this act disabled people can benefit from