By: John D. Dingell

From:  Detroit Free Press

This week marks the anniversary of the enactment of health care reform that I have fought for my entire career. The Affordable Care Act, which I helped author, is the most consequential reform to our health care system in recent history.

The ACA will improve health care coverage for 488,000 residents of the 15th Congressional District, provide tax credits and subsidies to 160,000 families and nearly 12,000 small businesses, and extend coverage to 18,000 uninsured residents, among many other achievements. The legislation also reduces the deficit by $143 billion over the next 10 years.

The new House majority has made no secret of its goals to repeatedly attack the very goal of health care reform — providing affordable care for all Americans. Yet as they attack the health care reform law, they offer no real solutions to address the problems they perceive in its implementation.

Repealing ACA will not lower our nation’s debt. In fact, the Congressional Budget Office found repealing ACA will add $230 billion to the deficit by 2021.

Like you, I believe we must reduce our deficit, and ACA will reduce our nation’s deficit by more than $1 trillion in the next 20 years. These savings will help get the system on a better road to recovery.

I have long said that no law is perfect, and I believe that as you draft legislation you cannot let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

And this legislation is good. Just look at the benefits only a year later.

Our children under age 19 can no longer be denied coverage by an insurance company for having a pre-existing condition. Young adults can now stay on their parents’ health plan until they turn 26. Four million eligible small businesses can receive tax credits for offering coverage to employees — covering 35% of the cost of coverage. Michigan working families on new plans now have free coverage of key preventive services, such as immunizations, mammograms and other cancer screenings. Seniors will now be receiving a 50% discount on brand-name drugs for entering the Medicare Part D “donut hole” coverage gap — a discount that grows until the “donut hole” is closed in 2020.

Insurance companies must now spend at least 80% of premiums on covering medical services instead of administrative expenses, CEO pay and profits. Insurance companies also must now publish online detailed justifications for any premium increases they are seeking that are more than 10%. A patient will be protected from insurance companies dropping them from coverage simply because he or she is sick. Patients will no longer be subject to a lifetime limit on coverage — limits that have caused some families to declare bankruptcy.

I will continue vigorous oversight in the 112th Congress to see that the implementation of and funding for the Affordable Care Act are done in a fully fair manner that benefits all Americans.

Read this at the Detroit Free Press