A little more than two years ago the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 was finally passed. Currently this health care reform bill sits before the Supreme Court, where, in fact, the wife of one of its very conservative members, plays on her relationship to her husband and earns hundreds of thousands of dollars in “consultant” fees as she works to destroy a health care reform bill that protects millions of Americans from the abuse of for-profit insurance companies.

She rails against health care reform as a “socialist take-over,” when, in fact, it maintains the involvement of for-profit insurance companies but puts limits on how they can abuse Americans in times of need. In addition, it provides coverage to millions of Americans who do not have access to health care through employment and are forced to purchase health insurance on the open market. The “evil” mandate that Republicans tout as “the death of freedom” actually ensures that insurance companies make a profit and can still afford to cover the costs of health care for the vast majority of Americans by spreading risk. We are transitioning to a system where everyone is insured and everyone shares the cost. Before health care reform, everyone could receive health care in an emergency room – but if a person had no insurance, we all absorbed the cost. Now everyone will share the cost of health care in an organized, planning-ahead way because everyone will have health insurance coverage.

I was, and continue to be, committed to health care reform based on my many years of work as a registered nurse. From my vantage point, I saw the consequences of a health care system where patients and families were held hostage to spotty and unpredictable health insurance coverage. In addition, lack of consistent insurance coverage for young and middle-aged adults worked to exacerbate the complications of their chronic illnesses because their access to basic health care, life-saving medications and other self-monitoring equipment was totally lacking or intermittent, at best.

In the two years since the ACA was passed, fierce politically-driven debate has made Mainers lose sight of the urgent problems that drove President Obama to seek a solution. We have forgotten that so many families in Maine couldn’t afford decent insurance in the first place or did not have it offered through their work place. Insurance companies routinely denied coverage to people because of pre-existing medical conditions, and too many insured families would find that when they needed coverage most – an accident, a cancer diagnosis, a heart attack – their plan had stifling limits on the coverage they could get. Some Maine people were literally being driven into bankruptcy when diagnosed with a severe illness. They were trying to keep up with insurance premiums and co-pays when they were least able to work.

The ACA has already made a difference in the lives of more than 100 million people nationwide. Here are just some of the ways the Affordable Care Act is already helping Maine families:

Insurers can no longer kick you off insurance when you get sick. Before the law, insurance companies could investigate people with high health bills to look for reasons to cancel their coverage. Today, insurers can’t kick you off your policy when you need it most because of an innocent mistake you made when filling out your initial enrollment form. An example might be simply failing to report a diagnosis of acne when you were a teen.

Young adults without job-based coverage can stay on their parent’s health insurance plans until they reach age 26. Thanks to this new law, 2.5 million young people have gained coverage nationwide. As of June 2011, 7,329 young adults in Maine gained insurance coverage as a result of the new health care law.

Health insurance companies can no longer deny coverage to children with pre-existing condition. Beginning in 2014, insurance companies will not be allowed to deny coverage to adults with pre-existing conditions.

The new law bans insurance companies from imposing yearly and lifetime dollar limits on health benefits – freeing cancer patients and individuals suffering from other chronic diseases from having to worry about going without treatment because of their lifetime limits. Already, 431,000 Maine residents, including 172,000 women and 103,000 children, are free from worrying about lifetime limits on coverage.

These are just some highlights of health care reform. So listen for the Supreme Court Decision coming in the next few weeks. If the swing vote, Justice Kennedy, decides to throw his vote in with the corporate-cozy, conservative justices Scalia, Thomas, Alito and Roberts, the law will be gutted or thrown into limbo. And, I can guarantee that Mainers along with all Americans will, once again, be subjected to the unfettered, abusive, greed-driven practices of the for-profit health insurance industry.

Maurie Hill lives in Standish.