The astronomical cost of maintaining a healthy life is staggering and not affordable for many people. One in seven people in the United States are denied access to healthcare in the world's richest country. Each year, thousands in the United States die from preventable health complications. Rapidly rising, health care spending will double in the next few years. Billions have been poured into the healthcare system, yet we are not healthier and live shorter lives. Our healthcare system is in transition and unstable. In the preamble of the United States Constitution it promises for each citizen to “…promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity…”. Welfare in today’s context also means organized …show more content…
The government assumed the “duty” of providing health care for aging adults and people living in poverty. President Lyndon B. Johnson signed Medicare and Medicaid into law on July 30, 1965. Today, it is the largest health insurance program in the country, providing coverage for more than 71 million low-income people. Medicaid and Medicare are two programs that have become such a fabric of the health care system, it would be hard to imagine a world without either of them. In 2010 President Barack Obama's health care law, the Affordable Care Act, made changes to government-assisted health insurance so it would cover more people. The law aims to expand Medicaid to more low-income people and worked to cover the middle-range of citizens who made too much money to qualify for Medicaid but also could not afford to buy private insurance on their own. By covering millions more, the Affordable Care Act contributed to changes seen in five decades of Medicare and Medicaid. The gains in health care coverage and access to care made under the Affordable Care Act has fundamentally changed the health insurance