Seniors and the Affordable Care Act
12 January 2012
Seniors and the Affordable Care Act
Strategic Approaches, Key Talking Points, and Messages
Focus on women and issues of particular concern to women; you will not lose men
1. Best overall message in support of the law: The law focuses on prevention and making health care more secure for families.
2. Key benefits of law: no more denial of coverage for pre-existing conditions; prohibits charging women more than men for coverage; mammograms and other cancer screenings with no co-pay.
3. Two key points regarding Medicare: the law protects Medicare and provides preventive care with no co-pay.
4. Best message on protecting Medicare: The law will protect Medicare benefits for seniors and strengthen the program for future generations by aggressively cracking down on waste, fraud and abuse, ending handouts to insurance companies, and providing free preventive care with no co-pay.
5. Key values that connect to seniors: prevention, peace of mind, and respect.
6. Cost concerns should be answered by family costs (greatest concern), rather than business or system costs.
Focus on consumer protections in the law
1. Talking point: It’s important that political rhetoric doesn’t get in our way of knowing what’s in the law. There are real consumer protections in this law.
2. Best tested message: The law provides basic consumer protections and helps make health care coverage more secure for our families by ensuring no one can be denied coverage due to a pre-existing condition, like asthma for a child or breast cancer for a mother, or lose coverage or be forced into bankruptcy when someone gets sick. It also requires that members of Congress get their health care coverage from the same plans as millions of Americans.
3. Emphasize that these consumer protections allow us to have control over our health care. That’s because there will be fair rules like keeping insurance companies from excluding sick kids and adults from coverage, or making it too expensive for them to buy insurance, or allowing premiums to increase without giving good reasons, or spending our premium contributions on more bonuses and advertising rather than health services.
4. Trust in government: If a question is asked that implies the person favors the consumer protections but doesn’t trust the government to regulate an industry—the best response is one that says the law requires us all (consumers, doctors and nurses, hospitals, insurance companies) to take responsibility and play by fair rules. Our government is a government for all the people, not just for the privileged.
5. Briefly address: closing the donut hole, keeping seniors out of nursing homes, improvements to Medicare Advantage (improves quality, decreases excessive payments).
Focus on prevention and preventive services in the law
1. Best messenger – doctors and nurses. Best message: “I know that this law will help my patients: The law begins to shift our health system from a ‘treatment for a disease’ focus to a ‘let’s invest in keeping people well’ focus. This shift will help me (doctor or nurse) be a better doctor/nurse. Prevention keeps healthy people healthier longer, results in earlier diagnoses with improved outcomes, and helps bring down costs for you and your families.”
2. Talking points: (a) When it comes to prevention, the law provides important new services including preventive care visits – a ‘well person exam’ annually – that allows doctors to spend more time talking with and listening to their patients. (b) The law means there’ll no longer be financial barriers for cancer screening.
3. Inoculate against cost concerns: prevention and aggressively removing waste and overpayments help families save their dollars (people are much more concerned about their personal bank account than the viability of the ‘health care system’).
4. Best overall message: Starting this year, all new insurance plans must cover key preventive services, like well-woman exams, cancer screenings for men and women— such as breast and cervical cancer screenings (which many put off because of the cost involved) - and contraception. This will save thousands of lives every year and bring down costs because it’s far more effective to detect cancer early and to prevent an unintended pregnancy. Covering preventive care is important to good health care.
Focus on non-discrimination/equity (cost and access)
1. Talking points: (a) Women will no longer pay more for their health care or coverage than men of the same age. (b) Individuals and small businesses will have the Exchange where they can comparison shop and become part of a ‘pool’ that offers them better coverage at more competitive prices—like large businesses have had in the past.
2. Best Message: Health care costs are hammering all Americans, especially small business owners and middle class families on their own. The new law provides individuals, such as farmers, and small business owners with access to quality coverage and preventive services they can afford.