Promoting Libraries for Affordable Care Act Outreach

Jamie Markus is being honored as an Affordable Care Act Champion of Change.

As the Library Development Manager at the Wyoming State Library, I spend my time creating and coordinating programs that enhance library services offered to our state’s 580,000 residents. The Library Development Office staff manages, promotes, and supports many exciting statewide library projects.

In July 2013, the Institute of Museum and Library Services, the American Library Association, and other partner organizations launched an e-health initiative, asking all types of libraries to support educational and outreach efforts surrounding the Health Insurance Marketplace.  The Library Development Office at the Wyoming State Library took the lead in coordinating with potential partners in Wyoming. 

As the project progressed, I realized that libraries would become key partners in the outreach effort due to their status as community centers and trusted sources of information. I met and talked with as many organizations as I could find to discuss how Wyoming’s libraries could help to support the efforts of Healthcare Navigators and those working to inform residents about the Affordable Care Act, the Health Insurance Marketplace, and the HealthCare.gov website.

The Wyoming State Library designed and supplied 15,000 Health Insurance Marketplace handouts to Wyoming libraries, including twenty-three public libraries, seven community college libraries, a tribal college library, and the University of Wyoming libraries. More than 90 library outlets in nearly every major community in the state had the opportunity to provide these handouts to library patrons. 

I participated in an untold number of meetings, teleconferences, webinars, and email exchanges to promote the idea of using library public meeting spaces and public access computers to those groups involved in educational events and insurance sign-up workshops on the Affordable Care Act and Health Insurance Marketplace. I also coordinated the production of two state-wide webinars and two programs at the 2013 Wyoming Library Association Annual Conference, informing library staff about the Affordable Care Act, the Health Insurance Marketplace, our Wyoming partners, and available resources.

The demand for information about the Affordable Care Act was high. I was glad to be able to promote libraries as a safe and trusted place for outreach organizations to put residents in touch with the information they wanted and needed.

Jamie Markus is the Library Development Manager at the Wyoming State Library.

The Affordable Care Act as Viewed by a Sister of Mercy

Joan Serda is being honored as an Affordable Care Act Champion of Change.

As an educator, I know the importance of health care. I’ve always had the privilege of having health insurance, so I’ve never had to worry about paying a medical bill or paying for a prescription. I haven’t had to be concerned about how to pay for the care of a sick child, spouse, or parent.

In Georgia, there is a lot of poverty, and many people don’t have health insurance. In Bibb County, where I live, there are tens of thousands of young people without health insurance.

Emergency rooms are not the answer to good health care. They are intended for emergencies. Emergency room visits are time-consuming and should be a last resort. They result in very expensive care and no follow-up. Often, patients don’t improve, and visits simply reoccur.

The Affordable Care Act is a step in the right direction, enabling many to obtain health insurance that they can afford. If children are healthy, they will learn more, and our schools will improve. If adults are healthy, they will be able to work more effectively and help their children grow, be healthy, and contribute to society.

I know a woman who had a possible cancer but refused to go to the doctor because she couldn’t afford it. But now, through the Affordable Care Act, she was able to get insurance and see a doctor. Another woman I know had insurance through her employer, but coverage through the ACA drastically reduced her premium without sacrificing health insurance coverage.

As a Sister of Mercy, I vowed to serve the poor, sick, and uneducated. Working with Get Covered America gave me the opportunity to help people become better educated about health coverage. I volunteered for ten hours a week to help people understand the Affordable Care Act. Many people were unaware of the opportunities available, and many had seen and heard false information. Some were fearful of something new and did not understand how health insurance works. Much education is needed, so I will continue as a volunteer for Get Covered America during the upcoming enrollment period.

Joan Serda is the Assistant Justice Coordinator for the Sisters of Mercy of the Americas South Central Community.

Dedicating His Life So Others Could Live Their Own

Andrew Cray is being honored posthumously as an Affordable Care Act Champion of Change.

Andrew Cray dedicated his life to making sure others could live their own.  

Every day, Andrew fought tirelessly for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender, or LGBT, Americans to be treated with dignity and fairness. His work touched so many lives in so many ways, from working to secure protections for LGBT homeless youth to collaborating with the Obama Administration to implement the Supreme Court’s marriage equality rulings. At the center of his work, however, was his belief that the foundation of equality rests on the ability of all Americans to access comprehensive, affordable, and inclusive health care.  

Andrew was just 28 years old when cancer tragically took his life this past August, but his passion for equity in and access to health insurance existed long before his diagnosis. As a transgender man, Andrew knew the challenges and the needs of the LGBT community personally and was all too familiar with the common occurrence of transgender people being denied insurance simply because of their gender identity, as well as with the startling statistics. According to a recent Center for American Progress report, one in three LGBT people with incomes at or below 4 times the federal poverty line lacked insurance, and 72% of gay, lesbian, and bisexual people reported experiencing discrimination when attempting to find coverage through their employer for a same-sex partner. The eternal optimist that he was, Andrew believed that, with the right reforms and the improvements, those numbers could change.

Like many LGBT Americans, Andrew saw the Affordable Care Act as a vehicle for change and an opportunity to open up life-saving medical care to a community too often systemically and financially excluded. After passage, he worked with the White House and the Department of Health and Human Services to end discrimination against LGBT people by health insurance companies. He collaborated with the federal government and state governments to ensure accurate data collection on sexual orientation and gender identity, which will serve as the foundation of future LGBT health advocacy. Andrew also worked with various partners to ensure that many of the new insurance options were inclusive of same-sex couples and transgender Americans.

As important as these reforms are, he also knew that, for the law to work, people needed to be educated and enrolled, which is why he, along with colleagues at the Center for American Progress, Sellers Dorsey, and the Federal Agencies Project, co-founded Out2Enroll. Over the last year, Out2Enroll has helped educate and connect countless LGBT Americans with their new coverage options under the Affordable Care Act. 

All of this work took on a new meaning for Andrew when, in September 2013, he was diagnosed with cancer. Throughout his treatment, he continued his legal advocacy and outreach work but also decided to utilize his personal story to convince young Americans, including young LGBT Americans, to enroll in health insurance. In an op-ed in The Advocate, Andrew wrote, “Our LGBT community is resilient and strong, and particularly for those of us who are young and have our entire lives in front of us, it may feel like we are invincible. I’ve learned the hard way that I’m not.”

Several months later, this past July, Andrew found out that his cancer had returned and that it was terminal. As his partner, and soon to be wife, I sat with Andrew as we discussed what he wanted to do with the time he had left. He said he wanted to continue his life’s work: fighting to ensure that all Americans, including LGBT Americans, can access life-saving medical care.

One month later, Andrew passed away far too quickly and far too young, but the benefits of his work live on. As he wrote in The Advocate last March, “Cancer has taken a lot from me physically and emotionally. But it hasn’t taken away my voice…I want to make sure other young LGBT people understand why getting covered is so important. I hope that my community will listen when I say — please, take care of yourselves. Be out, be healthy, and get covered."

Sarah McBride is the Special Assistant for LGBT Progress at the Center for American Progress and authored this blog post on behalf of Andrew Cray. Andrew Cray was a policy analyst at the Center for American Progress. He was her husband and colleague.