Category

health insurance

Affordable Care Act Provides Relief for Mental Health Patients

By Viji Sundaram

According to Randall Hagar, director of government relations with the California Psychiatric Association, a state mental health parity bill signed by Gov. Davis in 2000 required insurers to cover the diagnosis and treatment of a range of mental illnesses under “the same terms and conditions applied to other medical conditions.” The intent of the law was to eliminate the disparity in co-pays and higher deductibles.

What Other Media Are Saying About the Government Shutdown

By Staff

No progress was made to end a budget impasse that resulted in a government shutdown since 12:01 a.m. on Tuesday. News of the shutdown, which includes the closure of all national parks and a work furlough for 800,000 federal employees, generated a big response in the ethnic press. Key areas of concern included the shutdown’s effect on federal workers, loss of funding for social services, ramifications for immigration reform, and environmental impacts. 

 

Government Shutdown: A Win for Obama (and Cruz)

By David Swerdlick

For the moment, Obama  now has a foil who's making it easier for him to stand up for his health care initiative and outline his budget priorities. And Cruz gets to show that he's first among equals when it comes to opposing anything linked to Obama. Meanwhile, federal employees will be furloughed, any salary that they forfeit won't be spent in a still-fragile economy, and Congress's inability to make a deal will eventually threaten another loss of confidence in the markets.

Poll: Youths, Minorities Are Key Supporters of Obamacare

By Anna Challet

A strong majority of ethnic voters and young people in California support the Affordable Care Act, according to the results of a new Field Poll. The broad support from ethnic voters and voters under 30 has tipped the scales toward popular support of Obamacare in the state. More than half of all California voters (53 percent) say they support the ACA, although white voters slightly oppose the health care law, with 49 percent opposing and 44 percent supporting.

Playing Politics, Governors Jindal, Perry Ditch State Citizens on Healthcare

By Marc Morial

Last week, 400,000 poor and underserved Louisianans, many them people of color, were shut out of potentially life-saving health insurance under the Affordable Care Act (ACA). A Louisiana House health committee voted down a measure that would have forced Governor Bobby Jindal to opt into the Medicaid expansion provision of ACA that is being subsidized by the federal government to cover vulnerable communities.

The Consequences of Failing to Obtain Health Insurance in 2014

By Viji Sundaram

To buy or pay the penalty? That is the question that will confront many U.S. residents in the coming months, when open enrollment season begins for health insurance coverage, under the terms of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), also known as Obamacare. ACA will be fully implemented on January 1, 2014, when most legal U.S. residents will be required to have “minimum essential health coverage” or make a “shared responsibility payment,” as the Congressional Budget Office puts it in regulations it rolled out last fall. 

Low-Income Health Programs Are Crucial to Success of Healthcare Reform

By Daniel Zingale

The state legislative session is now in full swing, and lobbyists and advocates are descending on Sacramento to talk health care coverage – who should be eligible and how they should get it. It's a debate you might have expected Obamacare to end. But though California and millions in our state will benefit when the president's plan kicks in next January, about 3 million to 4 million Californians, the majority of whom are legal residents, will remain uninsured.

‘Escape Fire’ Documentary Sheds Light on the American Healthcare Crisis

By Kurt Thurber

Escape Fire, which opens October 5, 2012, is constructed on three-levels: the human element, the problems with healthcare and the examination of the solutions for providing world-class, cost-efficient healthcare. While a work of nonfiction, the message and narrative pace suffers to some degree without an impact singular villain-- no Roger for Michael Moore to badger, no McDonald’s dollar menu to clog Morgan Spurlock’s arteries or usurpers to the King of Kong throne. Only the mass poor decisions of nutritional diet, antiquated training of medical students and a system that is more profitable if the U.S. general population is in need of constant medicinal treatment.