The Cruelty of Republican States in One Chart

[ProSense]

25. How Obamacare Helped Paul, A Homeless California Man, Finally Get Insurance

How Obamacare Helped Paul, A Homeless California Man, Finally Get Insurance

By Scott Keyes

Hope isn’t an insurance policy.

This is the lesson that Paul, a 55-year-old San Francisco man with thin, wispy hair reminiscent of a benevolent mad scientist, learned three years ago when his closest friend died from cancer. She was diagnosed in early 2010. Four months later, lacking insurance and any means to pay for care, she died.

<...>

Things weren’t always bad for Paul, who preferred not to divulge his last name or have his photo taken. He had worked for a big technology company for years. When layoffs came following the dot-com bubble, he took a buyout and used the money to start his own IT consulting business. It was “thriving,” he explained. That is, until demand dried up after the 2008 market crash. His business went under and he was soon evicted...He has been homeless for nearly five years, sleeping in his car and trying every day to find work. It’s been 12 years since he had health insurance. For Paul, health care has meant aspiring, an annual flu shot, and confidence he won’t get sick.

<...>

On Monday, Paul showed up at Project Homeless Connect, a services fair for homeless people held near the Castro district of San Francisco, unsure of what he’d find...The problem is that, even though he had no health care, no home, and no assets, he still wasn’t eligible for California’s Medicaid program, Medi-Cal. That’s because for years, only people who were elderly, disabled, or had dependent children were eligible for Medi-Cal. Childless adults like Paul were excluded from the system.

That is, until Obamacare.

One of the most important reforms in the Affordable Care Act is the expansion of Medicaid to cover anyone with an income at or below 133 percent of the federal poverty level...I ran into Paul after his consultation with SF PATH, a federally-funded insurance program that has served low-income San Franciscans, but will automatically roll over all its enrollees into Medi-Cal beginning on January 1, 2014.

- more -

http://thinkprogress.org/health/2013/10/11/2761931/homeless-obamacare/