Oct. 13--During her first run for Congress in 2008, Ottumwa ophthalmologist Mariannette Miller-Meeks made passing portable, affordable and accessible health care legislation a top priority.
Even before the legislation ultimately passed this past March after a nearly yearlong debate, Miller-Meeks was ready to renew her effort to fix the broken health care system.
She watched what Congress was doing -- and more importantly, what it was not addressing. So on Nov. 30, she again announced her candidacy and again made reforming health care a priority.
This time, her message is repeal and replace, though her opponent remains the same, Rep. Dave Loebsack of Mount Vernon.
Loebsack and Miller-Meeks are on the ballot with Constitution Party candidate Jon Tack and Libertarian candidate Gary Sicard. The election is Nov. 2.
"It seems to me that in a representative democracy it would have been fruitful for those in office to have listened to their constituents and tried to address a bill that would truly do the things that they want, that is people want to have access to affordable health care," Miller-Meeks said.
She stressed the unpopularity of the bill and named it as one reason to oppose the legislation.
More recent polls have shown the legislation growing in popularity, as some provisions have started to go into effect.
Loebsack has said if re-elected he will do everything he can to ensure the legislation is not repealed.
"I talk about what's good in the bill. I talk about the fact that young adults can stay on their parents' insurance until age 26. I talk about the $250 check seniors should be getting. I talk about children with pre-existing conditions who can now get insurance," Loebsack said, while acknowledging the legislation represented a compromise.
Loebsack also has touted a provision he helped get into the health care reform bill that changes the Medicare reimbursement system to make payments based on quality service rather than the number of services.
"I'm very proud of all the work I did on that," Loebsack said. "That was one place where the leadership of the Democratic party is not from Iowa, and they have no idea what was happening in Iowa, but enough of us got together to convince them that it was not just right for Iowa but it was right for America."
Loebsack said his strategy for fighting the misinformation surrounding the legislation -- though it's popularity has increased, the health care bill still has an unfavorability of 40 percent, and a majority of people remain confused about it -- is to press forward with what is good in the bill.
Miller-Meeks said people's confusion is understandable, blaming members of Congress for not reading the bill so they couldn't explain or refute people's incorrect claims.
"The statement in there that was going to allow reimbursement or payment for end of life counseling, that was taken out of context and that was not what it was meant to do; that could have been addressed in the bill and the language could have been altered so that ... would have made it palatable to people and would have taken away this notion that we're pulling the plug on grandma," she said.
Miller-Meeks said recently passed legislation requiring legislation be written in plain English will reduce miscommunication.
Overall, Miller-Meeks said she doesn't disagree with many of the provisions in the bill Loebsack is touting, including not being able to deny coverage for people with pre-existing conditions and allowing young adults to stay on their parents' insurance.
But she said it accomplishes none of the goals she set in 2008. Miller-Meeks said insurance is not yet portable, nor affordable nor universally accessible.
"I would argue that we're going to have more money now in this bureaucracy that is actually going down and filtering down to individuals and allowing them to get access to care," Miller-Meeks said. "Perhaps what could have been done to begin with was to have done a bill in an incremental fashion that truly would help to control costs and would make premiums affordable and would make health care portable, and it didn't do any of those things."
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