right? but these essential health benefits, this idea you buy an insurance plan that needs to have basics because a lot of people don t know what they need until they need it. so that s part of the problem. that s the nature of insurance. so if you don t have certain things in the health benefits and then all of a sudden you need them, your insurance plan hasn t done you any good. for example these skinny plans that we talked about may not have inpatient hospitalization covered. okay. so you re 25 years old, you re immortal in your own mind. you think i just need a skinny plan. then you get into a car accident or diagnosed with some disease, that is the most common reason you are going to be going to the hospital and all of a sudden your plan doesn t cover it. that s part of the issue. i think it s a really important point. about maternity health because people scratch their heads and say men, why do you need maternity health benefits? the problem is that otherwise only women are going
essential health benefits, if you don t want pediatric ophthalmology. the tax credit which you can argue whether that s a good way to do it or not. the tax credit would give you resource and give you that tax benefit that employers have that might make that look different. i don t know that it would. if my insurance doesn t go up because i have a pre-existing condition though, see what i m saying. since i have a pre-existing condition. speaking of the way obama sold it, trump is going to step all over republicans by selling it the same way. he said you re premiums are going to go down and deductibles. if you like your doctor you re going to keep your doctor. thanks one and all for being here. appreciate it. an armored vehicle plowing into a crowd of protesters as the deadly unrest grows in venezuela, but will the government back off any time soon? plus, the votes that could be felt around the world. another divided country is making a decision and one american president i
welcome back. you re watching cnn. the health care bill that passed the house that is now facing a battle through the senate, where senators are already warning this will have to change if it will ever pass. as it stands right now, here s what we know about the bill in its current form. the individual mandate is out. employer mandate is out. essential health benefits like prescription drug coverage and maternity care are changing or out. and the big one, despite assurances from the house republican members, coverage for pre-existing conditions is changing. let s go to our doctor here at cnn, our chief medical correspondent, dr. sanjay gupta. just first, the easiest question is what are doctors saying about this? you know, the medical community is hard to paint with
i never heard of something done like this before. we don t know how many people are effected. we don t know the human cost will be or the financial cost. to take a vote without these answers is totally and morally and fiscally irresponsible. let s be clear. when they cap it back to the states, they cut funding for us. in virginia, we had 400,000 individuals who have health care who have been part of obamacare. these people are now going to be in jeopardy. they will endanger people who have pre-existing conditions. they will cut essential health benefits. they weaken our ability to keep our residents healthy and economically competitive. i don t think this will see light of day in the senate. it was disheartening to watch. i just got back last night from the trade mission from mexico. i got back last night and turned on the tv. having a big beer party celebrating what they did. people are going to lose lives. people are going to lose health
the next guest offered a key amendment that helped collect enough republican votes to pass the bill. thomas mcarthur as in the mcmcarthur amendment. could you briefly explain what the mcarthur amendment is? it does two critical things. three really. it restored the essential health benefits back to the federal standard. but threaten it does two things. it balances the need to make sure that people are people with preexisting conditions has coverage which is a commitment we made and i made and two allows everyone else s premiums to come down, which is a commitment that the last administration, president obama made and it unfortunately has been a total failure. premiums have skyrocketed and now we have 23 million people that simply can t afford it and millions more at risk of losing what they have today. so that s what i was balancing. ainsley: congressman, you ares best guest to have on this