INSTRUCTIONS:

1)Customize the highlighted fields below to personalize your letter to the editor.

2)Use the Epilepsy Foundation Media Guide to find up to five local newspapers serving your zip code.

3)Send your customized letters to the editor using the Media Guide, and monitor your media targets to see if the letter is published.

4)Questions? Email .

TEENS SPEAK UP! Letter to the Editor on Protecting Access to Health Care

As a [Rhode Island]teenager with epilepsy, I am concerned with the changes that Congress is considering to our country’s health care laws, especially the proposed bill that would allow states to waive Essential Health Benefits requirements and cut federal funds from the Medicaid program.

Over the course of their lifetime, 1 in 26 Americans will develop epilepsy. [I was diagnosed in 2009, and have lived with epilepsy since I was eight years old.]

People with epilepsy depend on affordable access to prescription medications and medical care to live well. Prescription medications, chronic disease management, and other basic services are currently covered as Essential Health Benefits (EHBs) in ACA Marketplace insurance plans and Medicaid expansion plans. However, Congress is considering state waivers that would allow these plans to no longer cover all EHBs. This would mean a return to annual and lifetime limits on coverage. With these waivers, basic health services could become unaffordable for adults and teens with epilepsy, like me.

I urge Congress to protect EHBs and to oppose the proposed restructuring of the Medicaid programs, which would lead to an estimated $840 billion in cuts over ten years. Medicaid provides health care to one third of people with epilepsy, including many children from low-income families and adults and children with disabilities. Reducing the program’s funding could threaten their health care and seizure control, and risk lost wages and productivity for people living with epilepsy along with their families and their communities.

In [March 2017], I traveled to Washington D.C. as a Teens Speak Up! representative of the [Epilepsy Foundation New England], and met with my members of Congress to promote quality health care for people with epilepsy. Along with 3 million other Americans with epilepsy, I am counting on Congress to protect our access to care.

[Name], [Age]

[Hometown]