Thread by @MEPFuller

Here’s what you need to know when someone claims the GOP health care bill — the AHCA — covered people with pre-existing conditions:

(Thread)

The AHCA allowed insurers to take into account “health status” when setting premiums. That means they could charge more for pre-existing conditions.

So while insurers couldn’t *deny* sick people, they absolutely could charge them more — an unaffordable amount more.

Under the bill, states that wanted to allow insurers to charge those people more would have to set up a “high-risk pool,” where sick people could get coverage.

The problem is those high-risk pools are notoriously underfunded, so people with pre-existing conditions pay more.

There were caveats in the bill stating that people with pre-existing conditions would be covered—a toothless statement undermined by actual the policies—and provisions that people with continuous coverage wouldn’t be charged more.

But people have coverage lapses all the time!

The CBO projected that half the states would ultimately apply for these waivers, meaning our health care system would have dramatic differences across state lines, potentially making affordable premiums in non-waiver states even more untenable.

There was also an $834 billion cut to Medicaid over the next 10 years that would of course hamper health care for the sick, the poor, and everybody else.

No doubt a nearly $1 trillion hole in federal health care funding would have added even more stress to the system.

I’d also add that the big fight in the House over health care centered around pre-existing conditions.

Remember when the Freedom Caucus held out until they got changes and they cancelled a vote? The Freedom Caucus won, and that’s the bill that passed the House.

Anyone who claims the AHCA protected people with pre-existing conditions is either too stupid to know they’re lying, or too dishonest to care.

Either way, you probably shouldn’t listen to them, because it’s a verifiable lie to say it protected those people.

It didn’t.