Population Health Policy Analysis custom essay
Introduction
Health policy is any decision, action, plans, and a guided principle of action that is used
to achieve the desired health results. They include every aspect of practice and changes that are
necessary in accomplishing a certain health goal. They are very dynamic and the fundamental
basis for health practice. The main importance of health policy is standardization and provision
of a set of regulations and code of conduct within which health workers perform their role in
healthcare. Through reinforced policies, the impact of the medical profession is felt, (Baker .P. et
al. 2018). The healthcare policy helps determine the boundaries and create the accepted set of
activities in relation to achievement of optimum patient care. They help achieve the quality set of
standards and prevent malpractice within a healthcare setting. The policies with different health
facility but they all cover a specific level of fulfillment and patient satisfaction. It is difficult to
dispute between understanding of each health policy and the specific roles and guided actions
towards certain practice. Health policies affect the determinants of health through several
positive ways. They enable easy accessibility of health services for all people thus promoting
healthy status for everyone. They affect the health seeking behavior by improving the quality of
care and some of the common lifelong conditions are managed; leading to improved health.
People are empowered to positive healthy behavior and change of attitude towards health.
The social security act amendments
The social security act amendments was a bill signed to law in the year 1965 by President
Lyndon Johnson in July, 30 th (Grover 2016). The law established two types of acts; Medicare act
which was a health insurance act for the elderly and the Medicaid cover, a program for the less
fortunate and people of low incomes in the United States. It was a very beneficial policy that
POPULATION HEALTH POLICY ANALYSIS
improved the delivery of healthcare services in the US even though several amendments have
been suggested by the congress. The policy is still effective as Medicaid and Medicare are the
main medical covers in America. The Medicare helped to improve the access of health services
for the people aged 65yrs and above, and also enabled them pay for the services through bill
coverage and medical insurance coverage (Gustman & Steinmeier 2018). Through the policy
many elderly patients were able to access quality healthcare services. Since its passage in 1965,
it was well received and appreciated by all for the benefits that were associated. Additionally,
even though the main funding was from the employer’s tax and contributions, they never resisted
its effects as they actually took active participation in putting it into practice.
Within the first three years of the policy becoming a law, more than 20million members
were already enrolled. Before the introduction of the act in congress, the president became
worried for there was no any national health insurance plan. Thus, he had to gather all his
members and initiate a debate to help develop a well adhering and effective policy that could be
applicable to the most population. The initiation of the project was begun by President Harry
Truman. There were various challenges at the time as most of the people never supported
socialized healthcare. As a result, even President Truman was forced to back off from the plan
that he had been developing for sometime due to the negative influence of the social security
system and his current administration (French et al.,2016). However, after Truman’s rule, the
social security system then backed on the issue and decided that it was a great idea to incorporate
it in their healthcare system.
One of the main factors that led to the propagation of the new policy was the evidence
based statistics. During the 1950 census, the government noticed that the population of the
elderly had increased from 3million in 1900 to 12million in 1950. That created a sound alarm
POPULATION HEALTH POLICY ANALYSIS4
and required immediate interventions to ensure that the population was well catered in terms of
health. Most of the elderly people had a lower income of less than $1000 annually and very few,
one in eight people had medical insurance cover. Within two years, from 1961 to 1963, the
population of the aged increased from 12 to 17.5million (Kramer & Didden 2017). Thus, the rate
of the increasing population confirmed that the people needed to tackle issues of healthcare
especially targeting the elderly population. With the advancement in age there was an increase in
the cost of healthcare and thus most of them could not manage to cater for them. At that time in
America, the cost of living was also going up making it more difficult for most of the population
to access quality healthcare services.
Another factor that led to the social security system and the congress to develop a new
system of medical coverage was the private insurance sector. Many of the insurance companies
considered the population a bad health risk and thus they never wanted to partake in their
coverage due to the probability of them suffering loss instead of profit. The private sector was
increasingly becoming incapable of providing affordable, quality, and complete healthcare
coverage for the increasing older population. Thus, the government decided to act very fast
having several meetings as the congress and the house representatives held meetings from 1960
to come up with a solution. Hence in the summer of 1965, the congress passed the legislation and
it was signed by President Lyndon.
State relation
The social security act was established to provide general welfare for the federal old age
benefits and improvement of healthcare service delivery in various states. The law enables the
states to provide quality care services for the marginalized populations such as the elderly, the
blind, the crippled, the dependent, improvement of maternal and child welfare, and improvement
POPULATION HEALTH POLICY ANALYSIS5
of public health. The act ensures that there is coverage of the monetary compensation for the
targeted populations especially because they are not earning. That was enabled through the
implementation of unemployment compensation laws through establishing the social security
board and revenue improvement for several other purposes of health (Rosenthal et al.,2016). The
law is applicable to all states as they have ensured that their populations were covered by the
Medicare and Medicaid insurance health covers. Even though there have been improvements on
the law that has made an increase in the number of people that are covered by the two acts, they
are still being enacted up to date. Through the affordable care act, the population coverage was
even further increased to improve the health status of the whole population in America.
Under the section one of the law, all states were enabled to improve their financial
coverage to enhance health for the respective populations. Therefore there is a summated total
expected to be collected each fiscal year for every state as expected to take care of the medical
coverage. That is because when there is a shortage in the amount collected then the coverage
may be affected in terms of contributions. The sums collected were used to cover the states that
were participatory according to the Social Security Board and Title VI of the constitution (Brown
2015). According to section II of the law, all state and political subdivisions were to have the law
as mandatory and be in participation as required by the national laws. Hence the state should
provide financial contribution; there should be a specific state plan or unit that catered for the
overall supervision of the administration plan, all states should be ready to hear the cases out
especially for the elderly whose claims were denied, improvement of newer methods of
administration, and the board necessary to take part in the state management.
POPULATION HEALTH POLICY ANALYSIS6
Advocacy strategies
Improvement of the social security act involved application of various important
strategies that enabled counter covering and population servicing. Some of the strategies that
were applied by the states included; improvement of the methods of administration of the
insurance coverage, effective documentation of the state coverage and financial implications for
reference purposes, involvement of political partnerships and other private sectors to improve the
amount of revenue collected, proper assessment of the claims by the state before issuing of
coverage, and ensuring that the age requirements were above 65yrs for any participants (George
2018). Hence, all states were supposed to make their calculations and any amendments in the
amount contributed to enable payment by the secretary of the treasury as per the third section of
the law. The methods of payments of the money were analysed and concluded to be every
quarter beginning as per the state. The board usually certifies to the secretary of treasury the
amount that is supposed to be provided for each respective state. Through the social security act,
many Americans have had access to improved healthcare services and most of the aged
populations who suffer from chronic conditions, have been well managed.
POPULATION HEALTH POLICY ANALYSIS7
References
Baker, P., Friel, S., Kay, A., Baum, F., Strazdins, L., & Mackean, T. (2018). What enables and
constrains the inclusion of the social determinants of health inequities in government
policy agendas? A narrative review. International journal of health policy and
management, 7(2), 101.
Brown, J. D. (2015). An American philosophy of social security: Evolution and issues. Princeton
University Press.
French, E., von Gaudecker, H. M., & Jones, J. B. (2016). The effect of the affordable care act on
the labor supply, savings, and social security of older americans.
George, V. (2018). Social security and society. Routledge.
Grover, C. (2016). The social fund 20 years on: historical and policy aspects of loaning social
security. Routledge.
Gustman, A. L., Steinmeier, T. L., & Tabatabai, N. (2018). The Affordable Care Act as retiree
health insurance: Implications for retirement and Social Security claiming. Journal of
Pension Economics & Finance, 1-35.
Kramer, S., & Didden, B. (2017). Refugees and social security: the personal scope of the
National Old Age Pensions Act (AOW) in the Netherlands. In Beyond the refugee crisis:
A reflection from different perspectives on the Dutch case (pp. 27-33). ITEM.
Rosenthal, J., Goetzmann, W. N., & Elias, J. (2016). Social security 1935. Yale School of
Management.
