Report: New Obamacare High-Risk Pool May Turn Away Sick People

But...but...President Obama said his massive health care takeover would make it illegal to deny coverage based on preexisting conditions. Here is the video of President Obama making this point during his health care address to Congress last fall.



The Hill reported:

The Obama administration has not ruled out turning sick people away from an insurance program created by the new healthcare law to provide coverage for the uninsured....

Administration officials insist they can make changes to the program to ensure it lasts until 2014, and that it may not have to turn away sick people. Officials said the administration could also consider reducing benefits under the program, or redistributing funds between state pools. But they acknowledged turning some people away was also a possibility...

Oh my! Obamacare does not cover pre-existing conditions for children until 2014!

I guess Democrats should have actually read the bill before they passed it. President Obama will have a hard time removing his foot from his mouth this time. He said as recently as Friday:

"This is a patient's bill of rights on steroids," the president said Friday at George Mason University in Virginia. "Starting this year, thousands of uninsured Americans with pre-existing conditions will be able to purchase health insurance, some for the very first time. Starting this year, insurance companies will be banned forever from denying coverage to children with pre-existing conditions."

Now that Obamacare has passed, AP reported:

Under the new law, insurance companies still would be able to refuse new coverage to children because of a pre-existing medical problem, said Karen Lightfoot, spokeswoman for the House Energy and Commerce Committee, one of the main congressional panels that wrote the bill Obama signed into law Tuesday...

Full protection for children would not come until 2014...