APA President Visits Senators to Speak Out Against AHCA

APA President Maria A. Oquendo, M.D., Ph.D., joined physicians from the Front Line Physicians Coalition to meet with seven senators and their staff members May 11, urging them to create a health care bill that would protect millions of currently insured individuals from losing coverage.

David Hathcox

The physicians discussed their grave concerns about the American Health Care Act (AHCA), a bill passed by the House of Representatives last month.

Meetings took place in the offices of Sens. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), Bob Corker (R-Tenn.), Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.), Cory Gardner (R-Colo.), Dean Heller (R-Nev.), Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), and Rob Portman (R-Ohio).

Coalition members spoke of the “devastating impact” the bill would have on access to insurance, specific benefits, and patient protections for millions of Americans. They also noted that they would evaluate any health care legislation based on how it “supports or conflicts with our shared principles.”

In addition to APA, the other members of the coalition are the American Academy of Family Physicians, American Academy of Pediatrics, American College of Physicians, American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, and American Osteopathic Association. They represent more than 560,000 physicians, trainees, and medical students. This same coalition had expressed its strong opposition to the AHCA in late April.

Coalition members urged the Senate staffers to write a bill that would accomplish the following:

• Protect Medicaid eligibility, benefits, and coverage.

• Establish affordable premiums and deductibles for older, sicker, and poorer patients.

• Prevent insurers from charging higher and unaffordable premiums to those with pre-existing conditions.

• Prevent loss of coverage for essential health benefits.

• Prevent insurers from imposing annual and lifetime limits on coverage including for those who receive medical coverage from their employers.

Coalition members also said that any new health care bill should include the following provisions:

• Ensure currently insured individuals do not lose their coverage due to policymakers’ action or inaction.

• Ensure uninterrupted coverage and benefits for the more than 20 million individuals and families covered in states that have expanded Medicaid or purchased qualified health plans from the exchanges. Also, ensure adequate federal funding to support Medicaid as currently available.

• Ensure that current subsidies are not eroded and that premium and cost-sharing subsidies are sufficient to make coverage affordable and accessible.

• Ensure children, adolescents, and adults with pre-existing conditions cannot be denied coverage, charged higher premiums, or subject to cancellation.

• Prohibit insurers from establishing annual and lifetime caps on benefits for children, adolescents, and adults and from charging higher premiums based on gender.

• Continue to ensure that all health plans provide evidence-based, essential benefits including coverage for physician and hospital services and prescriptions; mental health/substance use disorder treatment; primary care services; preventive services at no out-of-pocket cost to insured individuals, children, and families including contraception and other women’s preventive services; and maternity care.

• Ensure that parity between medical/surgical benefits and mental health/substance use disorder benefits is maintained.

“It was a great opportunity for the leaders of the six medical associations to really let Republican senators in Medicaid expansion states understand the profound impact of the AHCA on their constituents,” said Ariel Gonzalez, J.D., APA’s chief of government affairs. “The potential loss of essential health benefits is very real.” ■