Obamacare and young America

At the epicenter of the current government shutdown is The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, commonly referred to as Obamacare, which was signed into law in March 2010, and was subsequently upheld by the Supreme Court in June 2012. The new mandates and programs proposed by the law have drawn the ire of hard right Republicans and members of Congress with ties to the Tea Party. These Republicans responded by tying a provision to defund the Affordable Care Act (ACA) to the upcoming fiscal year’s spending bill. The halt on the passing of the spending bill over this provision has led to a massive government shutdown with hundreds of thousands of government employees furloughed until further notice.

The Republicans’ timing of this shutdown is not accidental. Open enrollment for the new ACA Health Insurance Marketplace opened on Oct. 1, which would allow Americans to sign up and access information about competing private health care providers. The overall goal of this platform is to expand the availability of insurance coverage while also maintaining a base level of quality and reducing the cost for individuals. Critics of the law argue that it encroaches on the privacy of individual citizens and will increase national spending.

The ACA website maintains that young people are eligible to remain on their parents’ health insurance plan until they are 26, and those under 30 are eligible for something called a “catastrophic plan.” Although this new plan doesn’t go into effect until 2014, when it does, it promises to lower premiums, but with higher deductibles. Essentially, the catastrophic plan is cheaper to purchase and it does not cover most health care costs, unless they are incredibly high due to some unexpected illness or accident.

This plan is viewed largely as a protective measure, but that has not stopped the formation of strong coalitions on both sides of the issue. Predictably, the right has launched a number of campaigns aimed at convincing young people to opt out of Obamacare. One of the most vocal and prominent youth groups opposed to Obamacare is Generation Opportunity, which launched a PR campaign aimed directly at college students, in which they hosted tailgating events, dance parties and passed out beer cozies that read “Opt Out.”

To drive their point home, the organization released a series of ads featuring a creepy Uncle Sam figure performing a young woman’s gynecological exam.

As other organizations in favor of Obamacare have pointed out, however, many of the mandates put into action by ACA make access to reproductive and sexual health care more affordable to young women. Organizations like Young Americans for Affordable Health Care make the case that youth participation in the ACA not only protects them from the potential of high medical expenses, but is also vital for the success of health care in America.

Young Americans for Affordable Health Care argues that “unaffordable coverage for the young could mean less affordable coverage for everyone – Young, healthy Americans buying health insurance makes coverage more affordable for everyone by spreading the risks and costs around to the entire covered population. Simply put, if young Americans don’t buy health insurance because it’s not affordable, they are no longer in the ‘risk pool,’ and thus subsidizing the cost of others.”

Unfortunately, whether or not young people will benefit from the new ACA programs is a concern that cannot be addressed until more effort is made by the Obama administration to explain the changing health care qualification under the new system. At the moment, the thing needed the most by young Americans—information—seems to be drowning in the cacophony.