Congress approved sweeping reforms of the US healthcare system last night that will outlaw flagrant abuses by insurance companies and bring near-universal health coverage to America for the first time in its history.
In a vote likely to transform the Obama presidency after a year of setbacks, anti-abortion Democrats dropped a threat to oppose the reforms and sided with their party to pass the biggest expansion of America’s social safety net since the 1960s.
The $940 billion measure, which was passed by 219 votes to 212, will extend health coverage to 32 million people who now lack it by requiring individuals to buy insurance and subsidising premiums for those who cannot afford them.
No Republicans backed the Bill, and party leaders who have fought White House reform efforts for the past 14 months vowed to punish Democrats at November’s midterm elections. John Boehner, the minority leader in the House of Representatives, called the vote Mr Obama’s “political Armageddon”.
Source : http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article7070716.ece
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