Address consumers’ concerns

The American Rescue Plan includes much-needed relief for consumers when it comes to health insurance costs, and at the center of this legislation is historic expansion of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and its marketplaces across the country, improving accessibility and affordability.

While many Coloradans and those in Evergreen will see relief under this bill, work remains to bring down costs for all consumers when it comes to their health insurance. In fact, only those in Colorado who get their plans via the health care marketplace will see any relief and, even then, it will only affect their insurance premiums, not out-of-pocket costs like co-pays and deductibles.

An estimated 23.6 million Americans with employer-based coverage have high premium contributions that amount to 10% or more of their annual household income or pay high-out-of-pocket costs that amount to 10% or more of their annual household income. Before the pandemic, 1 in 5 Coloradans struggled to afford their health care costs or went without care altogether given these high percentages.

Our leaders must work to address consumers’ concerns when it comes to all of these health care costs.

Susan Glass

Lakewood

Problem will only get bigger

Regarding John Flesher’s piece on the problems for crop storage with a warming planet, (The Associated Press) he brings up great points that societies and consumers across America and the globe will soon have to face in the near future.

I found it unnerving that farmers are looking to high-cost solutions such as refrigeration coolers which add to the greenhouse gas emissions and our growing climate problems instead of other sustainable solutions. The technology is expensive, energy-intensive, and requires close supervision, which makes it unsuitable for utilization in less developed countries, where post-harvest crop waste is dominant.

One of the most feasible solutions to this problem is to adapt by creating or utilizing heat-resistant potato varieties. There are potato varieties that have been tested to be more heat-resistant than others. Going a step further using technology on an agricultural scale, like Apeel can increase the storage and shelf life by easily adding a plant-based coating to crops.

Flesher and I do agree in his closing line that we as a society need to waste less food. One way to do this is to stop the overproduction of commodity crops in the U.S. Farming subsidies encourage and incentivize overproduction leading to large amounts of crop waste.

This article creates awareness of a problem that will only get bigger as we progress into a warming future. Uncovering all of the possible solutions instead of relying on the easiest or most expensive, is something the U.S. agricultural sector can improve upon.

Emma Martz

Denver