Affordable Care Act is worth a try

Speaker John Boehner said, “It's about fairness to the American people.” I can talk about fairness. Apparently, Republicans like the health care system as it's been because up to now they haven't done anything but use it as a campaign issue at election time.

Hillary Clinton attempted to reform it in the '90s and was vehemently opposed. Republicans took over and gave us the gatekeeper system - the system that gave a man given six months to live a one-month approval with his oncologist. In excruciating pain, he was to call every month and wait for an answer. The system that when the hospice nurse determined he needed an ambulance was told by the insurance company to fax the information and they'd get back to her in two or three days. That man was my husband.

Before going on Medicare, a widow's private insurance premium and co-pays plus rent left her $76 a month for everything else, taking everything she had, putting her in debt and forcing her to leave her home. This is the system Republicans don't want to tamper with. That's obvious because they never fix it. That widow is me.

Will God continue blessing a country that insists on treating its people this way? Check the first chapter of Isaiah. I don't claim the Affordable Care Act is perfect, but it's worth a try, even if changes need to be made when they see what works and what doesn't.

Margaret Bartlett

Cedar Rapids