Health care reform also known as Obamacare has a number of positive sides most people are not aware of. The majority of people consider Obamacare to be an excessive measure with no visible positive sides. This is because US citizens tend to find more negative sides than positive in different aspects of social life. Below are given several advantages and disadvantages of this health care reform that would help to make it clear whether Obamacare is associated with more benefits than drawbacks.
The most important advantage of the above reform is that it is likely to result in the decreased costs for healthcare services by means of insurance given to millions of people, which makes the preventative healthcare free of any expenses. This will help to cater for the needs of people before the need to provide more expensive services arises. Furthermore, the Obamacare caters for the needs of people in mental health services and treatment of various chronic diseases. People suffering from these diseases can use Obamacare if they cannot afford using more expensive healthcare services. Obamacare also helps to avoid life-long or annual restrictions regarding the healthcare services provided to the US citizens. Furthermore, the healthcare insurance plans covered by the new healthcare reform are meant for children aged up to 26 years. This leads to the increased profits received by various insurance companies without increasing the costs for healthcare services provided to common people.
According to the statistics of previous years, over 3 million people who had not been insured before were added to the insurance plans of Obamacare. This healthcare reform is also beneficial for tax-payers, mainly the middle class citizens. Furthermore, although business entities with over 50 workers are obliged to provide insurance to their employees, they would receive certain tax related benefits that are aimed to help them with the insurance costs. This is another advantage of new healthcare reform. Finally, Obamacare is likely to decrease the deficit in the state budget by more than $100 billion for the next decade. This is explained by the fact that it encourages the decrease of healthcare expenses. The above information is proved by the statistics of the previous years.
However, Obamacare is associated with not only positive sides, but also negative ones. There can be given a number of counterarguments in regard to this healthcare reform. Speaking about its negative sides, it needs to be noted that over 30 million of US citizens have to purchase their own health insurance for personal purposes. Most of these people had to cancel their agreements with insurance companies simply because they failed to provide basic healthcare benefits. The associated costs are much higher than the costs for the provided services. This leads to negative outcomes for the US citizens.
As for the business sphere, a number of businesses might find it more convenient and beneficial to allow their workers buying their own health insurance plans in exchange for paying the penalties associated with the healthcare reform. Some other businesses often choose better and more cost-effective insurance plans than those provided by Obamacare. What is more, increased insurance coverage is likely to lead to the increased healthcare expenses in the short run. This will happen because a great number of people will use the service of preventive testing. Various tests including tests for cholesterol or cancer are likely to be associated with greater expenses for healthcare providers. Those who fail to buy an insurance plan will be subjected to higher taxes, although some of them will be excluded from the list of taxpayers. It is estimated that most people will choose to pay higher taxes in order to avoid purchasing healthcare insurance. Such a situation is likely to result in negative consequences for both US citizens and healthcare service providers.