How the Affordable Care Act Will Impact Patients With HIV

The Affordable Care Act hangs in the balance, pending results of the coming Presidential election. To judge from this podcast, the outcome will have crucial implications for people infected with HIV, many of whom currently have no health insurance. Listen as the author of a major report on the topic describes key features of the Act that will impact the ability to achieve effective, early treatment for people diagnosed with HIV, both in the past and in the future.

Jeffrey Crowley is program director of the National HIV AIDS Initiative at the O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law.

The questions:

♦  Why don't we start with you telling us what the impact of the Affordable Care Act is on people with HIV?

♦  Your report shows that 25% with HIV have no insurance. That's a large amount!

♦  What will this mean for primary care physicians who care for people with HIV and AIDS?

Noteworthy quotation:  "This is really an exciting time for our domestic response to HIV ... We have exciting research which is really pointing in the clear direction of getting all people with HIV on treatment and in a stable source of careas soon as possible after infection, and now the Affordable Care Act is going to expand access to insurance coverage which is going to enable us to get more people on treatment."

How the Affordable Care Act Will Impact Patients With HIV

Reference:

Jeffrey S. Crowley and Jen Kates, The Affordable Care Act, the Supreme Court, and HIV: What Are the Implications?

Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, September 2012