While the ACA could have been much better in many ways that just weren't possible to get through the Senate, if you recall before that, there was pretty much no way at all to obtain any kind of insurance without getting it through an employer, and if you switched employers, your new employer's insurance could just tell you "sorry about that diabetes, we won't cover that since you had it before you started here." We would be in a much, much worse place right now without the ACA