Lake County Gazette

Rep. Randy Hultgren (R-IL) has co-sponsored H.R. 628, the Guaranteed Health Coverage for Pre-Existing Conditions Act of 2017.

As Congress works to dismantle the Affordable Care Act (ACA), which ensures health insurance coverage for more than 20 million Americans, Hultgren and the bill's cosponsors stepped up to protect those with pre-existing conditions.

“Many residents in Illinois suffer from costly and life-threatening conditions and fear losing insurance if coverage for preexisting provisions is repealed," Hultgren said. "Rest assured, as Congress moves forward in its efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act and replace it with a system that offers people in my district more health insurance choices with lower premiums and more affordable deductibles, this bill would cement in law that individuals with pre-existing health conditions and their families maintain access to meaningful, affordable health insurance.”

Before the ACA was enacted, insurance companies could deny coverage to anyone with a condition deemed pre-existing, even if the subscriber was unaware of its existence. In addition, the insurance companies could drop patients if they developed health conditions that required long, expensive treatments, such as cancer or chronic conditions like diabetes or high blood pressure.

"We can’t take a step backwards and return our country to a health insurance market that locks people with health conditions out of reasonably priced insurance,” Hultgren said.