No, no, no, I reject both of the premises in Mr. Kinsman’s recent letter to The Citizen (“Obamacare may force your kids into welfare status”).
Firstly, using a government program like Medicaid or CHIP does not predispose one to accepting a “nanny state” environment.
There is nothing insidious in the use of government programs. We pay taxes and all of society benefits from the things we provide to each other with that money.
The parents who I know who use Medicaid or CHIP as their children’s health insurance provider are happy with the access it gives to the healthcare system.
Secondly, Mr. Kinsman laments, “When the healthcare law is fully in effect in 2014, millions of people will be added to the healthcare program under the Medicaid expansion.” With all these previously uninsured people now competing for access to healthcare, Mr. Kinsman fears that many folks “who need healthcare the most will find it harder to get care.”
I think the author misses the point completely regarding the need for a program like Obamacare. All the millions of people, who have suffered without access to the U.S. healthcare system, can now join the rest of us and have access.
The demand for access to doctors will increase and, yes, it will have an impact on all of us. But the alternate is the status quo and that just simply isn’t working for the 44 million people who do not have health insurance.
As to Mr. Kinsman’s point about doctors refusing new Medicaid or CHIP patients, I am also concerned about this. In fact, I would also point out that the same problem is found with Medicare. Ironically, the fix for this is for more people to be using these programs.
Medicare for all? I say yes!
Joanne Killikelly
Fayetteville, Ga.
