Phil's Insurance

New health law is a prescription for distortion
By: JO CIAVAGLIA
Bucks County Courier Times


The onslaught of misinformation and distortions about the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act this political season isn't helping the many Americans who are confused about the law.

Who hasn't seen political ads claiming that under the health law, Medicare will be cut $500 billion.

But are any of these claims true?

Yes and no. Mostly it depends on what health coverage you have, who pays for it, how much you earn and how you earn it, according to health care policy and reform experts.


Next year employers will be required to list the value of employee health benefits on W2 forms. No, you won't be taxed on it.

But combine a take-no-prisoners political season with a law as voluminous and complex as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, and confusion explodes. Experts who've studied the new reforms say the truth is out there, but it can be hard to find.

Four out of 10 surveyed believed the health care law would require Americans to provide a government ID card to get hospital care. (It doesn't.)

Almost as many believed that committees would review medical histories of some people and decide whether they can get medical care paid for by the government. (That's also untrue).

Six in 10 think the law increases the federal deficit. (The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office projects the law will shrink the deficit.)

"The great irony is the law was designed to avoid a government takeover," said Timothy Jost, a law professor at Washington and Lee University who specializes in health care reform and policy. "It's a law that is intended to make private insurance work and it's troubling that it's being attacked as a (government) takeover of the markets