“The country has been fortunate to have Secretary Kathleen Sebelius leading the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) during this critical time, when the Affordable Care Act was implemented and our health care system transformed. She faced one of the greatest challenges any HHS secretary has faced, and managed it with enormous skill, real dignity, and impressive patience with a political atmosphere that can only be described as poisonous.

History will show that, by signing up more than seven million people through an unprecedented federal marketplace, she did as much to improve the public health as any official of our time. She also put the building blocks in place to improve care coordination and quality, and contain health care costs in ways the country desperately needs.

Secretary Sebelius’ legacy includes an end to gender discrimination in health insurance pricing, stronger consumer protections, and – most of all – millions of Americans who finally have the health coverage and care they need. That adds up to healthier people and a stronger nation.

Every family that is not denied coverage because of a pre-existing condition, every woman who isn’t overcharged for insurance, every senior whose care is coordinated, every young adult who can continue on a parent’s insurance plan, every person in an underserved community who finally gets care, owes Secretary Sebelius a debt of gratitude. She has served the nation extraordinarily well.”