With the recent decision by the Supreme Court to endorse the The Affordable Care Act (The ACA), The American Diabetes Association has something to celebrate.

This ruling means that the close to 26 million Americans who are battling diabetes and the 79 million who have prediabetes will have access to the crucial health care necessary for managing the horrible disease.

The Affordable Care Act is extremely important not only for diabetics, but all chronic disease patients, whose quality of life and overall health would dramatically decrease without the proper health care.

Larry Hausner, CEO of the American Diabetes Association, commented:

“Today’s Supreme Court ruling on the Affordable Care Act marks a crucial victory in our continued fight to Stop Diabetes®.

This law eliminates health insurance discrimination against people living with diabetes and provides access to affordable, quality health care and prevention programs needed to curb the current diabetes epidemic and prevent its devastating complications, including blindness, amputation, heart disease and kidney failure.”

According to the American Diabetes association, the Affordable Care Act means:

  • Seniors living with diabetes will have new options for Medicare. Those who get to the donut hole mark will pay 86% of the cost of generic medications and 50% of the cost of brand-name medications. Every year after that, the costs will go down until the close in 2020.
  • Insurers cannot stop children with diabetes from having insurance coverage just because of their condition, and all children can stay on their parents’ coverage until the age of 26.

  • As of 2014, insurance companies cannot deny coverage to patients with a pre-existing disease – like diabetes. (This rule is already in effect for adolescents 19 years old and younger.)

  • Higher rates will not be charged to people just because of their diabetes.

The ACA was needed because under the old health care laws, it was not illegal to deny health insurance for individuals with diabetes and/or charge them more for coverage because of their chronic illness. This left diabetes patients with the burden of not being able to afford simple, basic treatment, resulting in debt and worse medical conditions for the individuals, with some patients not even being able to go to a routine doctor appointment or afford the appropriate medication, such as insulin. Most of these medical problems could have been avoided, had there been an appropriate health care act in place.

Hausner concluded:

“Every day, the American Diabetes Association works hard to expand access to affordable care to prevent, delay and slow the progression of diabetes.

Upholding the law is a major step forward in our continued fight as we work toward full implementation of the Affordable Care Act. People with diabetes, and all Americans, will no longer be denied access to the health insurance they need, will not have their insurance run out when they need it most and cannot be discriminated against based on pre-existing conditions, such as diabetes.”

The ACA also has a program for the prevention of diabetes – the National Diabetes Prevention Programs (NDPP). It was put into place with the goal of developing more programs in communities for the prevention of type 2 diabetes because of the overwhelming success these programs have had in the past.

The American Diabetes Association is the number 1 organization in the U.S for the fight against diabetes. For more information about The American Diabetes Association. Click here.

Written by Christine Kearney