The Affordable Care Act that Professor Joseph Reisert viciously attacks in his column on Nov. 1 was passed in an attempt to fix major problems in this country’s health delivery system. We have excellent medical people and facilities but do not deliver them effectively. We spend about twice as much per capita as the average developed country on medical care, and yet our citizens die earlier than those of 49 other countries, all of which spend less.

According to Wikipedia, in 2010 Canadians spent $4,445 per capita on health care; we spent $8,233. Canadians live three years longer, have universal coverage and rarely suffer medical bankruptcy.

While the ACA is not what I would have preferred, it is a vast improvement over the previous system. Given the wealth, lobbying and advertising power of the health care insurers, who are bleeding billions of dollars from the current system, it is probably the best that could be expected from the current Congress.

Implementation of the law has been a disaster. Its problems must be fixed, causes of failure determined, and appropriate action taken. For the moment, attention should be focused on fixing the problems; simply lopping off the most convenient heads likely will compound the problems.

Comments about the Democratic Party not trusting ordinary people and Barack Obama’s not caring enough to make the law work are laughable. It is the Democrats who have been trying to increase the voting franchise, and it is not credible to think that Obama, or any other president, would not want his signature law to be a great success.

Reisert seems appalled that the government would force citizens to do certain things, I would point out that that is what governments do. I was required to serve in the military. That was much worse than having to buy insurance.

Edward Riggs Albion

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