The essence of good government is trust.
Kathleen Sebelius
In many ways, human health is the great global connector.
American research and resources have literally changed the face of humanity, by tackling deadly and once-deadly diseases.
I know how tough it is to stand up to powerful forces that prey on consumers.
We have by far the most expensive health system in the world. We spend 50 percent more per person than the next most costly nation. Americans spend more on health care than housing or food.
General Motors spends more on health care than steel.
In this 21st century world, some of our country's most significant exports and imports extend beyond goods and services: They also include innovation, knowledge, discovery, and healing.
I've spent my career fighting the worst practices of insurance companies.
Insurance companies can no longer refuse to cover Americans with pre-existing conditions.
There's a digital revolution taking place both in and out of government in favor of open-sourced data, innovation, and collaboration.
But for us Democrats, Obamacare is a badge of honor. Because no matter who you are, what stage of life you're in, this law is a good thing.
I'm a former insurance regulator. What companies really want and need is some clarity about what the rules are.
If you're self-employed, between jobs, or can't get insurance through work, you'll have access to affordable health insurance as good as Congressman Paul Ryan's.
But the dollars spent on economic incentives and new investment strategies are wasted unless we seriously address the two most important economic issues in Kansas: education and health care.
There are people in this country who have waited for decades for affordable health coverage for themselves and their families.
From 1965 to 1967, my dad, Jack Gilligan, served in Congress and helped pass landmark laws like the Voting Rights Act.
The premium tax credit that is in the Obama plan is exactly that - it is a tax credit, and it isn't cash. It is a discount on the amount that you pay for an individual policy based on your family size and your income.
The Democratic plan in the 'Affordable Care Act' has, I would say, more government support, more government regulation around trying to protect the finances of individuals, trying to protect people who had pre-existing conditions, making sure that they could actually be in an insurance market and not set off to the side.
The men and women who serve this great nation, whether they are stationed in Iraq, Fort Riley, or the Korean Peninsula, or they serve us at home as our community first responders, serve because they believe in America.
Although black and white Americans live, work, and learn together now, there is still injustice in America.
A healthy state encourages many voices - and lots of listening.
But wishing our Kansas soldiers 'God speed' is not enough. We need to comfort, care for, and protect their families. And we should ease the financial burdens that these families often face.
I believe we all agree that, for the health of Kansas, nothing is more important than education.
If your voices are not heard, you can be sure that many others will be - in particular those who are paid to present a point of view, and often do it most effectively.
Insurance companies can no longer refuse to cover Americans with pre-existing conditions. That's what change looks like.
More than five million seniors have already saved money on their prescription drugs, and almost 33 million have benefited from free preventive services. The president cracked down hard on Medicare and health care fraud, recovering a record-breaking $10.7 billion over the last three years, protecting our seniors. That's what change looks like.
And under Obamacare, insurance companies can no longer discriminate against women. Before, some wouldn't cover women's most basic needs, like contraception and maternity care, but would still charge us up to 50 percent more than men - for a worse plan.
Being a mother is no longer a liability, and being a woman is no longer a pre-existing condition! That's what change looks like.
I was governor of Kansas when Mitt Romney was governor of Massachusetts.
If you're under 26, you can stay on your parents' plan. You can go back to school or get extra training without fear of a health catastrophe bankrupting your family. Over three million previously uninsured young adults are now on their parents' plans.
Being a mother is no longer a liability, and being a woman is no longer a pre-existing condition!
We have an opportunity to create a future where we are actually encouraging providers to keep people away from acute care, whenever possible.
While closing our innovation gaps won't solve all our problems, we have some very real opportunities to improve the quality of care that's delivered to millions of Americans.
To me, part of the magic of this era is that the very same innovations, discoveries, and technologies that are allowing us to live longer, healthier lives are also creating a healthier economy.
What we've been finding is that when you remove the barriers to innovation, you can actually hold costs down while lifting entrepreneurs up and getting better health results.
We've been finding that when you empower engineers, scientists, and coders, they respond by creating new tools to empower physicians, patients, and parents.
Global health issues remind us - perhaps more than any other issue - that we are all children of the same extended family.
I think one of the most underreported and untouted benefits of the Affordable Care Act is the real investments we are finally making in this country in prevention.
The way the law is written, people who are under 250 percent of poverty, who have a marketplace plan, also are eligible to have some of their deductible and co-pay expenses paid through cost-sharing. Insurance companies basically front the money and are reimbursed by the federal government, by HHS.
The secretary actually already has a good deal of authority within the confines of the Affordable Care Act. Step one really is a question of whether or not HHS will continue to reimburse insurance companies for cost-sharing expenses.
Republican House members, including Tom Price, when he was still in the Republican House, sued HHS, suggesting that payment to insurance companies for cost-sharing exceeded the authority of HHS. That case was basically withdrawn when President Trump was elected, in hopes that the Affordable Care Act would be repealed - but we're back to the law.
The lower income individuals, under any Republican proposal, at least that I have seen, are real losers in the framework because there is not enough subsidy, not enough assistance, for them to realistically participate in the market. Particularly if you halt or rollback the Medicaid expansion, which is for the lowest income workers.
A lot of the discussion about rolling back the Affordable Care Act is about dismantling the marketplaces where individuals are shopping for their own coverage when they don't get it in their workplace.
