President Obama says he would give Obamacare, his signature domestic initiative, an eight out of 10 on the grading scale.
“The reason I don’t put it at a 10 is because you can always improve something,” Obama told ABC News in an interview published Wednesday.
The White House has been more bullish lately about public acceptance of the largest overhaul to the healthcare system in decades, even as the American public remains divided about the Affordable Care Act. Polls repeatedly show that more Americans oppose the law than support it.
“Sixteen million people or more have health insurance that didn’t have it before,” Obama told ABC, adding that this is the lowest rate of uninsured Americans “since we started keeping records.”
The White House has preferred to keep the focus on the drop in the uninsured rate, deflecting GOP questions about the rising cost of healthcare and the inability of some consumers to keep their preferred coverage.
And Obama criticized Republican governors for blocking the expansion of Medicaid in their states, which the White House says is an intentional attempt to undermine a central tenant of the Affordable Care Act.
“There are millions of more people that could be helped, and it won’t cost the state anything,” Obama said. “We’re just seeing some stubbornness that’s really based on ideology not on wise public health policy that is preventing most people in most states from getting the Medicaid that would save the state money in the long term.”
The president’s remarks on Obamacare came as he tried to link global warming to public health. The president is arguing that leaders must do more to limit carbon emissions, pointing to the impact that climate change has on asthma, allergies and insect-borne diseases.
