President Donald Trump declared Monday that his
predecessor Barack Obama’s signature reform and expansion of the US health
insurance system is defunct, after he cut subsidies to insurers.
“Obamacare is
finished. It’s dead. It’s gone,” he told reporters. “It’s gone. There is no such thing as
Obamacare anymore. It is — and I said this years ago — it’s a concept that
couldn’t have worked. In its best days it couldn’t have worked.” Since becoming
president in January Trump has persistently sought to end Obama’s Affordable
Care Act, cutting back some government budgetary support and pressing Congress
to repeal and replace it.
The effort in
Congress though has failed, last week forcing Trump to order an end to the
“cost-sharing reduction” program, payments to insurers designed to help
millions of lower income Americans afford coverage. “I knocked out the CSRs; that was a subsidy
to the insurance companies. That was a gift,” Trump said. “The insurance
companies have made an absolute fortune with Obamacare,” he said. But he said
that, to protect people who will lose their insurance, the White House is
working with Congress for “some kind of a short-term fix” before coming up with
a longer term plan.
AFP
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