“Washington needs to stop playing games with our health care and act a little more like Colorado”
In an op-ed that ran in newspapers across Colorado ahead of today’s Connect for Health CO enrollment deadline, John Hickenlooper explained how the Affordable Care Act is key to helping Colorado fight COVID-19. As governor, John expanded Medicaid to 400,000 Coloradans under the ACA, and now over half a million Coloradans rely on the ACA for health coverage. The ACA has also helped expand access to telemedicine, mental health care and likely an eventual COVID vaccine while keeping rural hospitals open.
Despite this, Washington Republicans are still trying to repeal the law when Coloradans need it most.
Hickenlooper wrote:
The Affordable Care Act has been a critical bulwark against the pandemic of COVID-19. When I was governor, we used the Affordable Care Act to expand Medicaid to an additional 400,000 Coloradans and cut our state’s uninsured rate by nearly two-thirds. Our Medicaid expansion helped save at least eight rural Colorado hospitals from closure and has been called “a coronavirus lifeline.”
Hospitals can even sign COVID-19 patients up for Medicaid on the spot if they think they’re eligible.
Medicaid expansion was bipartisan in Colorado — we brought lawmakers together from both sides of the aisle. When we announced our plans to expand Medicaid, we said it was a step toward making Colorado the “healthiest state in America.”
In Washington, Republicans are still trying to repeal the Affordable Care Act, which threatens to take health care away from everyone who gained coverage through that law. Sen. Cory Gardner has repeatedly voted to repeal the ACA, and President Trump refuses to reopen ACA enrollment in states that don’t have their own exchanges.
Gardner and Trump even support a lawsuit currently before the U.S. Supreme Court that could overturn the ACA, ending Medicaid expansion and jeopardizing protections for people with preexisting conditions — that’s nearly 2.4 million Coloradans.
When people need health care the most, this lawsuit could pull the rug out from under the over half a million Coloradans who have health insurance because of the ACA.
Read John’s full column HERE.
###
