President Biden turns his executive-order-signing attention to health care on Thursday, with two actions “that will begin to restore and strengthen Americans’ access to quality, affordable health care,” per the White House.
One of Biden’s Thursday actions is big news for people who have lost health care during the pandemic or missed the Affordable Care Act enrollment period—which Team Trump slashed to six weeks. Biden is directing the Department of Health and Human Services to offer a special enrollment period from February 15 to May 15, giving people another chance to get covered.
Biden is also directing federal agencies to “reconsider rules and other policies that limit Americans’ access to health care, and consider actions that will protect and strengthen that access.” In other words, rolling back the ways Donald Trump limited and undermined access to health care, for starters. That includes reconsidering Medicaid work requirements, after the Trump administration gave 12 states waivers allowing the work requirements.
The other order, as expected, repeals the global gag rule that, under Republican presidents, prevents any organization getting U.S. global health funding from even mentioning abortion as an option to patients. Beyond that, the “memorandum also directs the Department of Health and Human Services to take immediate action to consider whether to rescind regulations under its Title X family planning program.” Those Trump-era Title X regulations significantly defunded Planned Parenthood and other organizations that include abortion in their services provided.
That’s great news, although “It won't just be like flipping a switch to get all the providers of the Title X program back in,” according to Planned Parenthood President Alexis McGill Johnson—it will take time for them to reapply and rejoin the program.
As is the case pretty much across the board, big change will require Congress to act to strengthen and expand the Affordable Care Act … or more. But these actions will begin to undo the damage, and that’s worth a lot. Biden absolutely needs to ignore the dishonesty of the editorial boards and keep pushing forward.