The Atlantic featured an article yesterday titled Ted Cruz: The Obamacare Mess Is Only Going to Get Worse. In the article Cruz purportedly lays out his case against the ACA.
The article is long and I'm sure it could use a full and complete debunking, but I'll just focus on one quick lie that I shot down in five seconds.
In the 4th paragraph, Cruz says,
"One of the next shoes that is going to be dropping is you're going to see more and more people realizing they can't keep their doctor. Texas oncology, one of the very best cancer centers in Texas, has just announced it's not going to participate in Obamacare."
Is that true?
Go to the
Texas Oncology site and what do you know? Right there on the home page, they have a big fat disclaimer distancing themselves from Cruz. Click on the link and their statement reads, in part:
"Texas Oncology Addresses Misstatement by Sen. Ted Cruz
Sen. Ted Cruz has misstated Texas Oncology’s position on the Health Insurance Marketplace.
We have made no decision regarding participation in the marketplace, because it is not clear how the new plans will cover cancer treatment, together with related care that our patients need. We also have concerns about parts of the law that could put patients at significant financial risk."
I guess Cruz is so passionate about alerting people to the dangers of affordable healthcare that he merely misspoke. What other "misstatements" are embedded in this tawdry little article in the
Atlantic?
I've got to go to work, but I'd love to uncover more Cruz facturds.
Update:
While Cruz misspoke about Texas Oncology having decided not to participate in the Health Insurance Marketplace, Caldera in comments pointed to an article that describes a fairly serious loophole in the ACA that is giving Texas Oncology pause.
Here's the story by KHOU in Houston:
"According the law, patients who haven't paid premiums are given a 90-day grace period before their coverage is dropped. But the insurance company isn't obligated to pay the claims for the last two months of that period.
"The doctors and hospitals could easily treat a patient for one, two, even three months, without fully understanding they are not insured.”
That is a serious flaw, for sure. The ACA is surely complicated, and the more we separate the actual law from misstatements about it, the better off we'll be.
6:56 AM PT: To be fair, Cruz' remarks do relate to a serious ACA loophole. See update below.