Support Autism Insurance Reform-Contact legislators

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In a message dated 4/15/2011 5:01:48 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time,

jgilmore@... writes:

S4005/A6305 New Autism Insurance Reform Bill _

Take Action!_

(http://capwiz.com/a-champ/utr/1/KCAOPMDTXI/DIDHPMYUTL/6753672821) Best Ever

and Autism Speaks Supports it Too

I am sure you all recall the fiasco last year when every autism

organization in New York, except Autism Speaks, supported A6888, an autism

health

insurance reform bill that would have lead to real change. Our bill did not

pass, but fortunately we were able to persuade the Governor to veto the

legislation that was, which would have been a major set back for our families.

We were able to persuade Autism Speaks to work with the Autism Action

Network, the Foundation for Autism Information and Research, and SAFEMINDS to

get the type of reform we all want and people with autism deserve. And all

these groups and more are all supporting a new bill, S4005/A6305. And we

need your help to get it passed.

This bill does everything it should. It will cover speech, occupational

and physical therapies, which are specifically identified in the bill so

there is no mystery. It will cover behavioral therapies including ABA. It will

cover rehabilitative and habilitative care. It doesn’t force treatments for

autism to meet a much higher standard for efficacy than other treatments;

in fact. it applies the exact same efficacy standards that are used for

all other health care. There are no lifetime or annual caps. There are no age

limits. It will cover assistive technology, and psychological and

psychiatric care. This is the kind of bill that can make a substantial

improvement

in the quality and quantity of care available to people with autism. And it

will prevent families from going broke caring for their kids. This bill

sets a new standard for autism health care that hopefully other states and

the federal government will emulate once we get it passed here in NY.

Last year one of the ways we knew the autism reform bill the legislature

passed was no good was that we didn’t hear a peep of protest from the

insurance companies. Well, the insurance companies are beginning to scream

bloody

murder about S4005/A6305. We need to scream louder than them. This is a

groundbreaking bill and we need you to get involved to make it happen.

Please click on the Take Action Link to send an email in support of

S4005/A6305 to your State Senator and Assemblymember. And in the coming days

and

weeks we will need you to get on the phone, fax and word processor to get

this passed.

Please share this email with family and friends and post it to Face Book

and other social media. And if you support the work the Autism Action

Network does please make a contribution by clicking on the link below which

will

take you to our donation page.

_http://www.autismactionnetwork.org/donate.html_

(http://capwiz.com/a-champ/utr/1/KCAOPMDTXI/NVJXPMYUTM/6753672821)

Thank you.

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