Health reforms achieved primary goals, says Obama

US president Barack Obama has issued a strong defense of his record on health, saying that the Affordable Care Act (ACA) has achieved its aims of reducing the number of people without health insurance, improving the quality of care, and slowing the growth of healthcare spending.

Writing in the Journal of the American Medical Association, Obama said that when he took office he “had to deal with one of the nation’s most intractable and long standing problems, a healthcare system that fell far short of its potential.”1 One of the impetuses for reform was his “deeply held belief that healthcare is not a privilege for a few, but a right for all.”

Obama said that, despite the act’s success, …