The American Medical Association (AMA) said it would not be using the law to provide legal aid for people with cancer or other serious illnesses.
But that didn’t stop it from lobbying Congress to expand the law.
In 2012, the AMA lobbied Congress to create the Good Samaritans Act to provide medical care to anyone who needs it.
This year, the organisation lobbied Congress and the president to expand it to include people with serious illnesses as well as cancer.
The new law would cover patients from any age, but the AMA said it was worried about some of the people it was targeting with the new legislation.
It said the law was written for a particular age group of patients, who often don’t know how to access the healthcare system, or they are vulnerable to discrimination or harassment.
“We have to take care of these vulnerable groups first,” AMA President Dr David Harris said.
The Good, Samaritan and Medical Services Act, which has been signed into law by President Donald Trump, includes the following categories of people: people who are injured or killed by cancer or are otherwise at risk of being injured or dead; people with a disability; and people with disabilities who have been denied access to care or services because of race, ethnicity, religion, gender identity or expression, national origin, age, sexual orientation, genetic information, or marital status.
Those people are then covered by the new law.
The group is also covered under the Older Americans Act, and covered under Medicare.
But the group said it wanted to clarify that it did not think the new medical aid law was specifically meant to cover people with certain conditions, such as those related to mental health or addiction.
Dr Harris said that despite its intention, the legislation was “not designed to help people with mental health problems”.
“This legislation is designed to expand access to mental healthcare services for people who need them most,” he said.
“This is a good first step.”
He said the AMA was “hopeful that this legislation will help us all in the coming years”.
The AMA said in a statement that it believed the new healthcare law was not intended to cover all people.
It noted that the Act also covered people with pre-existing conditions, as well.
“Inclusion of people with these pre-conditions in the bill is not a justification for excluding people with the most serious medical conditions, including people with heart disease and cancer,” AMA spokesman Dan Gross said in the statement.
“A comprehensive review of the ACA is underway to better understand the scope of this provision, and how it affects the access to health care to people with special needs.”
The AMA also urged Congress to extend the existing Medicare health care law, known as the Affordable Care Act, for another four years.
“The American Medical Assistance Act is an important piece of our healthcare system and provides a critical safety net for people struggling with healthcare costs, but we cannot afford to leave the ACA in place for another year,” Dr Harris told reporters on Wednesday.
The AMA is not the only organisation lobbying for the expansion of the law, with other medical groups including the American Medical Protective Association, American Association of Neurological Surgeons and American Association for Neurological Surgery.
But it is the AMA, which is in charge of representing the US in international healthcare, that is the main proponent of expanding the law and is one of the few organisations that has already signed on to the new bill.
“What we’re seeing right now is a lot of pressure coming from Congress to do something about it,” AMA spokeswoman Sarah Binder said.
However, Dr Harris dismissed the idea that he had a mandate from the American people.
“I have a mandate,” he told reporters.
“If the American public wants this to continue, then they need to show up to Congress and say ‘this is the American way’.”
