Skip to main content
Erina Aoyama's picture

Children are among the biggest beneficiaries of the new health reform provisions, which include the ban on denying coverage to children with pre-existing conditions and full coverage of preventive care, such as child wellness visits. MomsRising has collected a number of great blog posts on how children will be affected by the new law, including the following:

  • Jocelyn Guyer of the Georgetown University Center for Children and Families attended Secretary Sebelius’ September 3rd Connecting Kids to Coverage Challenge event, reporting:

The star of the morning, though, was probably Bonnie, a mom from Maryland. "I speak to you as a mother and as an American," she began before going on to explain that her husband is an auto-mechanic who doesn’t have any affordable employer-based coverage.   So, when she lost her job, she found her family uninsured.  Luckily, she hooked up with a community-based organization that helped her file an application for child health coverage.  It took only 15 minutes from start to finish, and within 24 hours she got a call that her son qualified.  Since her son has asthma, it was an enormous source of peace of mind in a time of need.  As she concluded, "No mother, no parents should have to choose their mortgage and utilities over health care” for their child." 

Read more: Kids Don’t Have to Wait – Connecting Kids to Coverage Event Makes Case for Enrolling Kids Now

  • Jocelyn also writes that:

Building a more stable source of health coverage for parents and other adults, as envisioned in the full implementation of the Affordable Care Act, will fill a critical gap for struggling families. And with so many families yet to find solid footing in the wake of the economic crisis, it will be crucial to maintain access for children to Medicaid and CHIP in the months ahead.

Read more: Increasing Poverty and Lack of Insurance Underscore Need to Keep Affordable Care Act Strong

  • Brent Ewig discusses the affect of the law on infant mortality:

Fortunately, the Affordable Care Act includes several key provisions that could move preconception health recommendations into practice and have an impact on reducing infant mortality… None of these provisions are a silver bullet solution to the persistent and complex problem of infant mortality, but taken together they will go a long way to providing the commitment, leadership and resources we need to accelerate progress.

Read more: Key Provisions of the Affordable Care Act Addressing Infant Mortality

  • Lisa Shapiro, from First Focus, writes:

As we mark the six-month anniversary of the passage of health reform, families have much to celebrate today as several key provisions of the new Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act go into effect for children.  While there are a wide array of opinions on both sides of the aisle on the new law – from those that say health reform goes too far to those who lament that it doesn’t go far enough, the impact for children cannot be disputed. Children and families will be better off today and for many years to come because of long list of new child-focused policies that were included as part of national health reform.

Read more: Children’s Lives Will Be Changed for the Better

For more great blog posts about health care reform, check out our health care blog carnival here. Thank you!


The views and opinions expressed in this post are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect those of MomsRising.org.

MomsRising.org strongly encourages our readers to post comments in response to blog posts. We value diversity of opinions and perspectives. Our goals for this space are to be educational, thought-provoking, and respectful. So we actively moderate comments and we reserve the right to edit or remove comments that undermine these goals. Thanks!