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Photo: SEIU International
by Austin Corpuz
Editor’s Note: This story is published in We’Ced Youth Magazine Issue #3
In 2010, Obama signed one of the most significant health care reforms since the the establishment of Medicare and Medicaid in the 1960’s, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, more commonly known as Obamacare.
[pullquote_left]Jennifer Mockus is the Regional Operations Director of Central California Alliance for Health, an organization that helps connect people to appropriate health care providers in Merced. Jennifer says that one of the key aspects of Obamacare that most people don’t know that they are eligible.[/pullquote_left]
For most people, when you need medical attention, you seek a doctor. However, for others, seeking medical attention is not their number one choice. Why? Because of the cost of health treatments. To get medical attention, you must pay for their service, and that alone makes people want to avoid going to a health provider at all cost, because they can’t afford regular check ups! Going to the emergency room when they truly need it is usually their only action. Even then, a trip to the emergency room hurts your wallet even more so. The cost for a trip to the ER can reach up to thousands of dollars.
Obamacare raises the quality and standards of basic health care coverage to improve the care that Americans receives. This act allows millions of low-middle income Americans access to affordable healthcare by providing them with discounts on state or federally-run health insurance. The most important reforms included in Obamacare will be put into effect by January 1st, 2014.
Jennifer Mockus is the Regional Operations Director of Central California Alliance for Health, an organization that helps connect people to appropriate health care providers in Merced. Jennifer says that one of the key aspects of Obamacare that most people don’t know that they are eligible. That is the biggest challenge in the full implementation of Obamacare. She explains, “We need to do a good job of raising awareness of the fact that many people in our county will be eligible to access health care in a cost effective way. The less we work together collectively in the community, the harder the project becomes and the more complicated it is for people.”
